ENTANGLING ALLIANCES
I
It was cherry-blossom time in Japan.
Not only had the war ended in precisely the way the war should end, but
Nathan and Madelaine had lived through that horrible winter of 1918-1919
in the typhus pest house that was Siberia and come through unscathed.
It had been an overwhelming revelation to Nathan of the woman he was
growing to love with all the untwisted, unleashed, latent forces that
were best within him during the horror days of that winter. Cool,
poised, positive, Madelaine had never flinched, never complained, never
shirked the most terrible and revolting of situations. For two months
she had lain down to sleep each night in a medical train side-tracked
but fifty feet from carloads of frozen corpses piled like billets of
wood on freight trains in the forty-below-zero weather, waiting
wholesale interment far outside the city in the spring.
Nathan had been obliged to leave her in January. The central Siberian
Government at Omsk had fallen. The Czechs were departing for home.
Steadily and deadly, the bloody hand of the Lenine Government was
reaching out for crazed jurisdiction over all the Russias. Nathan made
the long trip out to Vladivostok and remained there helping to wind up
the post-war activities of the Red Triangle. Then he went down to Japan.
From January to the last of April he did not hear from the girl, and
there were nights when fear that she had succumbed to the typhus
tortured him so that the furrows in his cheeks and forehead were like
saber scars.
But the nightmare ended. He had gone down to Tsuruga to meet her. A
typhoon had churned the Japan Sea to a two-day fury. She had been ill.
With a stab of compassion Nathan beheld how weak and spent she was. They
dined in the little European restaurant on the second floor of the
ticket building at the length of the wharf.
“And you succeeded in getting sailings?” asked Madelaine.
“On the _Siberia Maru_ for the twenty-first. We’ve almost ten days to
rest and look around Japan. I’m sorry you look so tired. You need the
holiday!”
“How glorious it will be to get back to God’s country,” the girl
returned, “where there’s law and order and cleanliness and decency.
Where you can address a stranger on the street,” she laughed, “and have
him understand you at once!”
After lunch they had taken _kurumas_ across Tsuruga City to the station
where the train was being made up for Yokohama. Gradually Madelaine
recovered her buoyancy of heart, shutting away thought of the Siberian
horror which no panacea in the world but time could cure. In fact, there
were periods in the reaction when she was almost childish in her effort
to live now only for the present and the future. All that day they had
followed the great northern sweep of the Inland Sea whose colors and
vistas were like a painting on a Japanese screen. They had reached
Yokohama at seven o’clock.
They were like lovers on their honeymoon already. They changed into
civilian clothes. In the next few days they visited Tokio, Nikko,
Fujiyama, the Great Buddha and Torii at Kamakura.
It was cherry-blossom time now in Japan. And in cherry-blossom time in
Japan came that night when Nathan asked the Girl-Without-a-Name to take
his own and be his wife.
II
He had not meant to ask her to be his wife, not then. But the night
before they sailed he had gone with her on a last walk about Yokohama,
their final contact with the quaint, droll, beautiful empire of
cloisonné, and iris, of weird distances and romantic shrines, of—well,
just Japan.
It was a moonlit, lazy-warm May evening. They sank down to rest finally
in the little park opposite the International Y. M. C. A. The great
treaty port was hushed, that fantastic, pregnant, unreal hush which
permeates all Nipponese cities by night, even though they know little
clash of traffic by day. The hour was late. The park was deserted.
Street lamps had been extinguished; the moonlight made them superfluous.
The exotic shrubbery, the great yellow moon peeping over the top of a
gigantic pepper-tree, the sharp, intermittent cleek of the cicadas and
other night insects singing out of tune around them, now and then the
light of a pink-paper lantern bobbing along on the shafts of a distant
rickshaw turned that park into a Garden of Dreams.
Madelaine was clothed in a white frock, white pumps; she carried a white
parasol splashed over with quaint figures in pink. Nathan wore pongee
and a Panama. They had fallen into talk about the future; what each
expected to do when they reached home. They sank down upon a wooden
bench just off the main pathway and Nathan drew aimless marks in the
powdered trap-rock with his stick.
“I suppose I should go on with my medical studies,” Madelaine observed.
“But somehow—oh, dear!—they seem so colorless and prosaic now, after
what has happened in Siberia. I feel I have paid my debt there. Oh,
laddie, my whole life has changed so! Things that I thought so great and
vital have shrunken to such inconsequence. And others which have been
only vague instincts and intuitions seem to matter more than all else in
the world—even its sufferings just now. I don’t believe I can explain it
so you’d understand.”
But Nathan did understand.
“Madelaine,” he said slowly after a time, “I received a letter from Ted
Thorne about a month ago; he’s my sales manager who sent me out here in
the first place. Mosely, manager of our New York office, was killed in
France. The man who took his place can’t handle the work. Ted has
offered it to me. It carries ten thousand a year, now. You remember me
telling you how I expected the position once, but felt I lost caste at
Mrs. Mosely’s dinner party? Well, I’d like to go to New York now and try
again. But—but——”
“You have a ten-thousand dollar position awaiting you? How perfectly
splendid!”
“Madelaine, I can’t go back to what I left—the emptiness, the petty
troubles with petty people, the groping around blindly for social cues,
the—the—loneliness, Madelaine! I can’t go back to half-a-life again.
Despite all the horrors of war, I’ve been happy out here!—I’ve found
happiness out here. I want it to stay. It must stay! I can’t go down
into the Fog. Not again. I feel I’ve gained a little hilltop. I mustn’t
lose even that partial height. I can’t.”
“Nathan,” came the girl’s whisper, “do you know what you want?”
Did he know? The poet in Nathan spoke then.
“Yes,” he cried hoarsely. “I want to go on. I want to leave sordid
mediocrity behind me forever. I want fine, rare, delicate, beautiful
things about me. I want to live in an atmosphere of them and a home of
them. I want to feed my heart and my soul upon them. I want to make them
a part of me. I want to gain from life every last iota of artistry and
softness and richness it has to give. I want to do my work with a song
in my heart. I want every hour a golden moment and time just something
to pass away. I want money and opportunity to indulge that deep and
vital impulse that once prompted me to express myself in rhyme. Do I
know what I want? You ask me that! Yes, I know what I want! I want all
of these things. Not to imitate somebody else or because I was once a
poor, distraught young colt working in an abattoir for a dollar a day.
Not that! But for the sake of beautiful things and one hundred per cent.
living in itself—because beauty is—next to godliness! Yes, it is! But
there’s something I want more than all of that, Madelaine. I want the
woman I first saw above me on a Hill Top, standing in glorious sunshine
looking off across a far country. I want the good angel who saw me
wounded and exhausted, struggling up from low-lying Fog, and came down
to me and gave me her strength to make the Summit. I want the woman who
listened to my foolish, pent-up heartache that winter’s night in
far-away Irkutsk and opened her lap and told me that nothing else
mattered except lack of belief in myself. I want the woman who’s been
patient and ministering and inspiring in a thousand hours since—to go
home with me, Madelaine—to dwell with me—in a Palace Beautiful, dear
girl—whose windows look out upon Delectable Mountains. I want you, dear
Madelaine! And my heart is filled with such rich, mellowed love for you
that it chokes my throat. You stand for all of the things I’ve totaled,
dear girl. You’re the best and biggest thing that’s ever come into my
life. I want you—and I want you terribly!”
A pause. An insect cheeping somewhere under boxwood.
“Then why don’t you take me, foolish boy?” Woman Beautiful laughed
softly.
Hushed Japanese night, the moon riding hazily above the rakish branches
of eucalyptus now, cicadas singing on into eternity, paper lanterns
bobbing far across elfin dark! They stood amid the trillion blossoms of
cherry trees whose petals sifted all around them, and Nathan knew for
the first time in twenty-nine barren, heart-breaking years, the
sensation of a real woman’s soft arms about his neck and the sweet,
scented, delicate impress of a real woman’s kiss upon his lips,
returning his caress with a warmth and a tenderness that fused his heart
and his soul and made them as one forever.
The white parasol was lying on the bench. No one was left in the park
but themselves. The moonlight was again shining into a woman’s face as
they stood there for an instant and Nathan held her close. But she was
not weakly flaccid in his embrace. Her body thrilled to his.
“Dear lad,” she said in a faint whisper, “I’ve waited a dreary time for
your strong arms around me and your hard-shaven cheek close to mine. Oh,
I don’t mean merely since the Great Noon-time in Siberia. Years before
that, dear lad, years and years! Sunlit days, gray days, rainy
afternoons, empty twilights, nights when I wanted to sob in the
darkness—I thought of you and wondered where you were, and what you were
doing, and if in your heart there was a little lonely ache likewise. I
wondered how badly you needed me, dear lad, even as I needed you. For my
heart ached for Romance, too, until it almost seemed I’d accept my
disappointment and believe it had passed me by. But God is good. You’re
getting only a little orphaned girl, dear lad, found under a haycock on
the edge of a wood. But she loves you—loves you a bit terribly—she has
always loved you—loved you even before she knew your name, or where you
were, or what the sound of your voice was like. You are her life and her
world henceforth. She, too, has found her Other Half and her heart will
never greet the sunshine coming across the hill tops in the morning
without a song springing to her lips and tears to her eyes. It has been
a bitter wait, dear lad, and the way has not always seemed clear. But
the end of the trek—it is sweet, very sweet. We will go back, we will go
home. And all the beautiful things you have wanted, that I can help you
get—they shall come to you. All the artistry and softness and richness I
can help bring to you shall surround you. You shall do your work with a
song in your heart also. Every hour _shall_ be a golden moment. Time
_shall_ be a thing only to pass away. Oh, Nathan dear, I’m the happiest
of women. We’ll go home with the morrow. Together we will go home and
dwell—in a Palace Beautiful—whose windows look out on Delectable
Mountains, indeed!”
“To-morrow—at two o’clock—_home_!”
“Home!” she repeated. “Oh, Nathan!”
III
During that night before their departure, clouds blew in from the
Pacific and blanketed the sea-coast country. They awoke the next morning
to find a light drizzle falling. But it held up after breakfast and
Madelaine declared, as she turned in her room keys:
“I’ve several purchases to make before we go on board. Let’s go
penny-shopping together.”
They went out the west door of The Grand, brushing aside the eager,
solicitous kuruma men and turned northward along the back street afoot.
Madelaine wore a traveling suit of gray worsted, the short skirt
permitting a light, easy stride. Her head was covered with a mannish hat
of black velour, half the brim turned down. She cared little for the
wet.
They picked their way through greasy streets, but always when it was
necessary for the woman to walk ahead, the man’s eyes followed her
hungrily. Would he never become weary of simply gazing upon her? The
sheer grace and delicacy of her every curve and line; her erect, supple
carriage; her frank, fearless, appraising eyes; her perfect poise,
regardless of the situation; the ephemeral expressions which played upon
her cameo features; the neatness of her hair at the back of her neck;
what a thoroughbred she was to her finger tips!
They made many little purchases in stores and curio shops. Nathan could
not buy her the diamond he wanted until they reached America; his funds
were too low and he had no time to draw on home for more. Her diamond
must wait until they reached New York. But it would be a—_diamond_!
They were gradually wending their way toward the Oriental Steamship
wharf when a window of carved ivory curios caught Nathan’s fancy.
“Let’s go in and look them over,” Madelaine suggested. “We’ve still four
hours to spend somehow before sailing.”
They went inside. The shop was arranged European style, deep showcases
running along either side of the back. The proprietor laid out several
trays and cases for their inspection. Then a Japanese boy came and
jabbered at him.
“You excuse,” the proprietor grinned. “I send Angleese man sell you,”
and he went to a door opening into a sort of workshop and called in an
order.
The “English” clerk came forward, along behind the counter. Nathan’s
head was bent close to Madelaine’s, examining an ingenious carving.
Nathan turned to the clerk and held it out, his eyes still on it.
“What’s the price of this?” he asked. As he asked it, he raised his eyes
to the clerk’s face.
He was looking directly into the features of his father.
IV
His father!
Separated by the width of the show case whose edges both gripped
suddenly. Nathan and Johnathan gazed into each other’s suddenly ashen
faces.
“You!” cried Johnathan. “You! My—son!”
Johnathan had grown stouter but he had aged twenty years. Remorse,
loneliness, self-pity and the ever-present realization that he was an
exile had eaten into his features like acid. Both temples were white but
it was a weak, rusted, moth-eaten whiteness. His eyes were more watery
than ever and his mouth as loose, excepting for the petulant knots of
muscles in each corner.
“Father!” the boy gasped huskily.
Madelaine frowned, then looked on wide-eyed. From his son’s bronzed,
muscular face, Johnathan’s gaze leaped to Madelaine’s, then back again.
Ivory carvings were forgotten.
“What—are you—doing—out here?”
“I’m on my way back home from Russia,” Nathan answered mechanically. His
mind was still stunned with the drama of it.
“You have—been—to—Russia?”
“Siberia! Yes! I’ve been up there almost a year and a half, working
among the Czechs.”
Johnathan’s body had not moved. Only his eyes and face. Again the
father’s eyes sought Madelaine.
“Up in Siberia? Alone?”
“Yes. But I’m not going back alone. This is a very dear friend of mine.
Madelaine, apparently I can introduce my father. Father, this is Miss
Theddon. She is—going to be—my wife.”
“Your—_wife_? What’s become of——”
“Of Mildred? She died some time ago.”
“My God!” cried Johnathan weakly. He rubbed the back of a puffy hand
across his forehead. Down back of the counter he moved unsteadily to
reach the intersection where he could come out from behind the cases. He
had not acknowledged Madelaine or the introduction, by the way. It was a
distressing moment for Madelaine but she recovered as Johnathan came up.
“I’m sure I’m delighted to meet Nathan’s father,” she said.
Johnathan gave her a slight nod and turned at once to his son. In so far
as he was concerned, she might have been marooned on a ring around
Saturn.
The tears were streaking down Johnathan’s face. He raised his hands and
gripped the boy by his elbows.
“How long have you been in Yokohama?” he cried hoarsely.
“Ten days. But I lived here three months before I went to Siberia.”
“And you never looked me up!”
“I tried hard enough. But nobody knew any Johnathan Forge——”
Johnathan started at the pronouncement of his name. He shot a frightened
glance around.
“My name is Smith!” he cried—“John Smith!”
“I couldn’t know that, of course,” returned Nathan dryly. He was
beginning to recover from the shock of the encounter.
“You must come with me!” declared the father. “You must tell me all
about Paris and—home. I will find a place for you to——”
“I’m sorry, father. But Miss Theddon and I are sailing for San Francisco
at two o’clock.”
“Not to-day!”
“To-day, yes.”
“But—but—we’ve only just found each other.”
“That’s lamentable, of course. But I can’t help——”
“You must put off your sailing.” Johnathan said it as though he had
settled the entire matter.
Nathan shook his head.
“Sorry, father,” he answered. “It’s impossible! We’ve been lucky enough
to secure immediate passage, and we must get back. Miss Theddon is not
in the best of health and I’ve got a New York job waiting that can’t go
begging another moment.”
“My Lord! You’re not going to run after we’ve just found each other! Not
that, Natie, not that!”
“I’m not running. But I’ve been away from home a year and a half and
we’re expected back June first without fail.”
Johnathan looked around frantically, desperately.
“No,” he said after a time. “I don’t suppose you would stay, not for me!
I never cut much of a figure in your life, anyhow, did I, Nathan? You
and your plans never took much account of your father, did they? Maybe
if they had, I’d never have left home in the first place.” Again
Johnathan smeared the back of his hand across his forehead. He turned to
Madelaine. “For twenty-five years it was just like this!” he told her.
“And you see what it’s done to me.” He submitted himself abjectly for
general compassion and sympathy. Madelaine’s voice was courteous enough
but a bit icy as she responded:
“Your son has told me the whole story, Mr. Forge. I understand
perfectly.”
Johnathan was pitying himself too much in this closing phase of his
domestic drama to interpret her sentiment correctly. He assumed that
Madelaine was sympathizing with him against Nathan.
“He always was headstrong,” began Johnathan promptly. “Went right along
demanding his own way even as a beardless boy that couldn’t——”
“Pardon, Mr. Forge. You misunderstood. I said your son has told me the
whole story and therefore I recognize exactly where the blame lies.”
Johnathan gaped for a moment. There was no mistaking her calm hostility.
He turned to his son.
“Nathan!—For God’s sake, don’t go!—Don’t desert me now when I’ve just
found you again. I never deserted you, Nathan; for twenty-five years I
did my duty——”
It was awkward to have his father suddenly begin to act so. Other
customers had entered the shop and were beholding. Madelaine read on her
lover’s face the distress he was seeking a way to ameliorate, somehow.
Her indignation rose.
“Really, Mr. Forge, is it quite fair to appeal to Nathan so? Because
I’ve been under the impression you did desert him—and left him to face a
somewhat cruel set of circumstances.”
“What do you know about it?” snapped Johnathan. “You’re a stranger to us
Forges——”
“_Father!_ That’ll be enough of addressing Miss Theddon so, please! And
I suggest we find a place less public where we may talk.”
“Yes, yes!” agreed Johnathan. “The back office here. They’ll leave us
alone. Come into the back office, Natie.”
Nathan glanced at Madelaine. She nodded. They moved toward the back
office.
“Your woman friend will excuse us,” suggested the father curtly. “We
have much to talk over in private, Nathan.”
“Oh, no,” responded the son. “I don’t care to discuss anything I do not
wish Miss Theddon to hear.” And Nathan stood aside for Madelaine to
precede him into the cluttered little workshop. Johnathan was not so
courteous.
Johnathan, in fact, was piqued. In Madelaine he sensed an adversary.
Immediately he took no care to keep concealed his estimate of her, of
all women. They seated themselves, a smile of grim humor lurking about
Madelaine’s pretty mouth.
“First you will cancel your passage,” began Johnathan doggedly. “You
must promise me, Nathan! Remember, you’ll never have but one father.”
“I cannot and will not delay our sailing, father.” Nat’s voice was kind
but firm. “Now that’s settled, what about home do you especially wish to
know?”
Johnathan produced a soiled handkerchief and blew his nose. But he saw
that because of the influence of a “female” undoubtedly, the son was the
same adamant, bigoted colt he had always been.
“You might tell me about yourself,” he said lamely, petulantly. “You had
a wonderful little wife, Nathan. What happened to her?” Johnathan said
this for Madelaine. And he did not miss the pallor which took the
humorous lip-smile from the girl’s features as he said it. He had a way
to wound the girl, perhaps drive a wedge between her and his boy. “And
your child, Natie! Little Mary was one of the sweetest tots I ever saw.
What became of her?”
“She was killed by a truck a year before Milly died,” was the son’s
rejoinder. He said it stiffly. He wondered—if his father was to be
deliberately mean—if it might not have been better after all to ask
Madelaine to wait until the visit was ended.
“That’s hard, Natie. It must have been awful; you thought so much of
her. And Milly? I always loved Milly. She was such a wonderful little
woman and did so much for you. I remember she was the only one who stuck
by us in the factory the time you had that trouble with the help and
they all walked out on you.”
“Milly was untrue to me,” returned Nathan with continued stiffness. “She
ran away with that Plumb fellow and was killed—when a munitions plant
exploded in Russellville, New Jersey.”
Johnathan assimilated this after a time. He murmured philosophically,
“The ways of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. Blessed be the
name of the Lord!”
Nathan grimaced.
“What else do you wish to know, father?” he asked—and waited.
“And now you’re plunging into matrimony again _so_ quick! I don’t see
how you can do it, Natie—out of respect to Milly’s memory if nothing
else.”
Nathan kept his temper admirably. He could apologize to Madelaine for
the insult afterward—an entire lifetime of apology.
“I owe Milly nothing. I told you she ran away with Plumb. Anyway, we
won’t talk about that. You’re only dwelling upon it because you see it
annoys Miss Theddon. What other information can I give you?”
Johnathan’s manner changed.
“How about your mother?” he demanded like a challenge.
“Mother had a bitter time after you left us. She sold the Longstreet
house but a smooth oil-stock salesman cheated her out of the money. At
present she’s living with Edith.”
Johnathan turned to Madelaine.
“And among the things my son has told you,” he demanded, “did he
include, perhaps, an account of the twenty-five years of hell I lived
with his mother? For twenty-five years she was my trial and my cross. I
couldn’t stand it finally. I had to get out. There was no other escape
but flight. Human flesh and blood couldn’t stand it, I tell you! Wait
till you get to know her. Then you’ll sympathize with me. There’s
righteousness and justice in this world somewhere and the wicked get
their deserts.”
Madelaine made no comment. The pause which ensued angered Johnathan.
“From the very night I was married,” he went on in a trifle higher tone,
“the tussle began. Never once did she try to help me or stand back of me
in my battle with the world. She nagged me and she fought me. She——”
“Possibly, Mr. Forge,” interrupted Madelaine. “But why tell me about
it?”
“You’re marrying into the family, ain’t you? There’s—things—which you
should know.”
“I’m merely marrying Nathan,” responded Madelaine.
The interview was going badly. Great tears continued to roll down
Johnathan’s face and he blew his nose again and again.
“What business are you in, Natie?” he finally asked. He was an injured
man. There was not a doubt about it. All the world had it in for him.
“I secured a position with the Thorne knitting mills,” returned Nathan.
“I traveled for them a year and a half. Then they sent me out here to
the Orient. I’m going back as manager of their New York office.”
“Well, Natie, you have your father to thank for that! If it hadn’t been
for the business training I gave you, no firms would ever be offering
you any New York managements at your age. Why, when I was your age I was
lucky to draw twelve dollars a week. We worked for our money in those
days.”
Nathan finally felt it time to put a few inquiries himself.
“How does it happen you’re working here, father? Money give out?”
Johnathan turned quickly and looked through the window into a dismal
yard.
“The curse of us Forges, Natie,” he finally responded, “has always been
women. You’ll learn it one of these days!”
“How does it happen you’re working here? Money give out?” Nathan
repeated.
“I started to tell you, if you’ll be respectful and wait a moment. Don’t
be so hot-headed. Hot-headedness and lack of respect always were your
faults, Natie!”
Nathan waited as patiently as possible.
“I came out here,” Johnathan went on, “seeking love and surcease from
all I’d suffered. I met a woman. I thought she was in every way a woman
to be desired, Nathan. I married her——”
“You married her! You were never divorced from mother!”
“Oh, yes, I was! Do you think I’m a bigamist? I got a divorce from your
mother under the Japanese laws——”
“Mother never knew about it.”
“I can’t help that.”
“The divorce laws of Japan, Nathan,” explained Madelaine with a faint
smile, “are very simple. When a man grows tired of his wife in Japan he
may dispense with her by merely walking out and leaving her, first
informing the police to that effect, I believe. Then he contracts a new
marriage by going to live with his paramour and duly informing the
police to that effect also, giving his new residence. One of the Y. W.
C. A. girls explained it to me.”
Johnathan ignored Madelaine. He went on:
“I got a divorce from your mother under the laws of Japan. I married
what I supposed was a woman who’d be the wife I deserved—after all I’d
been through back in the States. But she was like all women. I lived
with her just two days. I was fool enough to intrust my bank account to
her. The third day she was missing and so was the money. I’ve never got
trace of either, since. I had to take a job.”
Nathan flushed again with the new insult to Madelaine. But for an
instant his anger was arrested by the announcement that his father had
been flimflammed by an adventuress.
“Edith has six children now,” he essayed, after a painful moment.
But Johnathan was not interested in the fact that Edith had six
children. He went on in the same whine:
“I’m living from hand to mouth, Natie. I’ve been here the last three
years—waiting on trade, interpreting for my employers because I learned
how to speak a little Japanese. Think of it, Natie—waiting on trade for
a godless heathen—me!”
“Under the circumstances it ought to be a very good position,” observed
the son.
The visit continued in this strain until noontime. Then they went out
together to a small restaurant and had tiffin. Johnathan managed to get
Nathan alone.
“Son,” he cried brokenly, “you must loan me some money. I’m at the end
of my rope. Some days I think there’s nothing left but to jump in the
Bay.”
“How much money do you need?”
“All you can spare me,” was Johnathan’s modest request.
“I’m low on funds, father. I’ve got just about enough to get me back to
Vermont. I wanted to buy Miss Theddon a diamond but have had to wait
until——”
“Could you let me have a thousand yen, say? That’s only five hundred and
ten dollars!—in cash!”
“It’s out of the question, just now. I’ve only a hundred and eighty
dollars with me and my passage across America will use up a hundred of
that.”
Ultimately Nathan gave his father twenty-five dollars,—fifty-five
ten-yen notes. Johnathan took them rather sourly. He placed more stock
in the money Nathan promised to wire when he reached Vermont.
“Oh, my boy, my boy! What are you doing?” he next cried, anent
Madelaine. “You’re fortunate enough for your first wife to die on you.
Straightaway you go putting your head in the halter again! After all I
tried to save you from! After all your father’s example! Oh, well! You
deserve nothing but the misery coming to you! This is a just world!”
“Let’s not talk about Miss Theddon, father. She’s the sort of lady I’m
afraid you wouldn’t understand.”
“Wouldn’t I, though? Don’t try to tell me there’s any kind of female I
don’t understand! I’m older than you and therefore must know better. And
never mind how many miles of land and water separate us, young man,
remember I am always your father. I am always your father!”
“Just what has that to do with an understanding of womanhood?” asked
Nathan quietly. The old, old feeling of groping in a fog the moment he
came in contact with his father came over him. He wanted to fight it
savagely.
“Just you wait till you’re married to her a spell—long enough for the
‘new’ to wear off! You’ll see! You think she’s fine and grand now, just
because she’s got a pretty face! But you wait! You’ll be sorry not
taking your wise father’s advice. Just as you did once before. Wait till
you see her running around in broken corsets or dirty underclothes——”
“Father, you’re disgusting. Please change the subject!”
“You can’t tell me nothing about women, young man! Didn’t I live
twenty-five years with one! They’re all alike! And ninety-nine per cent.
of ’em are bad—bad clean through to the spleen. But I’ll pray for you,
my son—I’ll never cease praying for you!”
V
The _Siberia Maru_ was prompt in casting off. Johnathan grew a bit
abusive, then hysterical, as the hour drew near for departure. He
clutched his boy as though he would hold him by force. Nathan waited
until the last moment. Then he turned and extended his hand.
“Good-by, father,” he said.
Johnathan’s face resembled the hue of a drowned corpse when he said
good-by in a whisper. Nathan hurried aboard. Hatches were being battened
down, winches fastened, the gangplank raised, as he found Madelaine by
the rail high on the promenade deck. Side by side they leaned over and
watched the crowd below. In that crowd Nathan finally located his
father’s upturned face.
Madelaine started to say something sympathetic to her lover, but the
three-minute blast of the vessel’s departing whistle drowned out her
voice.
Slowly the liner backed from her little stall in the great port. A steam
tug at her prow turned her southward.
Nathan lost his father’s figure in the crowd, then found him again.
Johnathan was using his handkerchief alternately to smear his face and
then wave the little flash of white as bravely as he could.
“Have I done right by him, Madelaine?” begged the son brokenly. “For
heaven’s sake, tell me if I’ve erred?”
“You have not erred, Nathan. This is a world in which our sins punish
themselves—always.”
Nathan looked back as the ship’s great engine-beat started, a throbbing
which would not cease until they paused in Honolulu harbor, ten days
later.
A lone figure was on the farthest point of the dock. A tiny white
kerchief was rising and falling weakly. Then an incoming liner hid it
from sight.
------------------------------------------------------------------------