at Tubal Cain, he stood in a fine rain at the side of a light road
wagon, drawn, like John Wooddrop's, by two sweeping young horses,
held by a negro, and watched the final courses of his new furnace. The
furnace itself, a solid structure of unmasoned stone, rose above thirty
feet, narrowed at the top almost to half the width of its base. Directly
against its face and hearth was built the single high interior of the
cast house, into which the metal would be run on a sand pig bed to
harden into commercial iron.
On the hill rising abruptly at the back was the long wall of the coal
house, with an entrance and runway leading to the opening at the top
of the furnace stack. Lower down, the curving artificial channel of
the forebay swept to where the water would fall on a ponderous overshot
wheel and drive the great tilted bellows that blasted the furnace.
The latter, Alexander knew, must have a name. Most furnaces were called
after favorite women; but there were no such sentimental objects in his
existence. He recalled the name of the canal packet that had first drawn
him out to Harmony—the Hit or Miss. No casual title such as that would
fit an enterprise of his. He thought of Tubal Cain, and then of Jim
Claypole. He owed the latter something; and yet he wouldn't have another
man's name.... Conrad Wishon had surmised that the owner of Tubal Cain
had vanished—like Elijah—on a Glory-wagon. That was it—Glory Furnace! He
turned and saw John Wooddrop leaning forward out of his equipage, keenly
studying the new buildings.
“That's a good job,” the Ironmaster allowed; “but it should be, built by
Henry Bayard, the first man in the country. It ought to do very well for
five or six years.”
“Fifty,” Hulings corrected him.
John Wooddrop's eyes were smiling.
“It's all a question of charcoal,” he explained, as Wishon had, long
before. “To be frank, I expect a little difficulty myself, later. It
is surprising how generally properties have been newly bought in
the county. I know, because lately I, too, have been reaching out.
Practically all the available stuff has, been secured. Thousands of
acres above you, here, have been taken by a company, hotel—or something
of the sort.”
“The Venealic Company,” Hulings said; and then, in swelling pride, he
added: “That's me!” Wooddrop's gaze hardened. Alexander Hulings
thought the other's face grew paler. His importance, his sense of
accomplishment, of vindication, completely overwhelmed him. “And beyond,
it is me!” he cried. “And back of that, again!” He made a wide, sweeping
gesture with his arm. “Over there; the Hezekiah Mills tract—that's me
too; and the East purchase, and on and round. Fifty! This Glory Furnace,
and ten others, could run on for a century.
“You've been the big thing here—even in the state. You are known on
canal boats, people point you out; yes, and patronize me. You did that
yourself—you and your women. But it is over; I'm coming now, and
John Wooddrop's going. You are going with those same canal boats, and
Alexander Hulings is rising with the railroads.”
He pounded himself on the chest, and then suddenly stopped. It was the
only impassioned speech, even in the disastrous pursuit of the law, that
he had ever made; and it had an impotent, foolish ring in his ear, his
deliberate brain. He instantly disowned all that part of him which had
betrayed his ordinary silent caution into such windy boasting. Hulings
was momentarily abashed before the steady scrutiny of John Wooddrop.
“When I first saw you,” the latter pronounced, “I concluded that you
were unbalanced. Now I think that you are a maniac!”
He spoke curtly to his driver, and was sharply whirled away through the
grey-green veil of rain and foliage. Hulings was left with an aggravated
discontent and bitterness toward the older man, who seemed to have the
ability always to place him in an unfavorable light.
VI
DOCTOR VENEADA returned for the first run of metal from Glory Furnace;
there were two representatives of the other capital invested, and, with
Alexander Hulings, Conrad Wishon, and some local spectators, they stood
in the gloom of the cast house waiting for the founder to tap the clay
sealing of the hearth. Suddenly there was a rush of crackling white
light, pouring sparks, and the boiling liquid flooded out, rapidly
filling the molds radiating from the channels stamped in the sand bed.
The incandescent iron flushed from silver to darker, warmer tones.
A corresponding warmth ran through Alexander Hulings' body; Glory
Furnace was his; it had been conceived by him and his determination
had brought it to an actuality. He would show Wood-drop a new type of
“maniac.” This was the second successful step in his move against the
Ironmaster, in the latter's own field. Then he realized that he, too,
might now be called Ironmaster. He directed extensive works operated
under his name; he, Hulings, was the head! Already there were more than
a hundred men to do what he directed, go where he wished. The feeling of
power, of consequence, quickened through him. Alexander held himself, if
possible, more rigidly than before; he followed every minute turn of the
casting, tersely admonishing a laborer.
He was dressed with the utmost care; a marked niceness of apparel now
distinguished him. His whiskers were closely trimmed, his hair brushed
high under a glossy tile hat; he wore checked trousers, strapped on
glazed Wellington boots, a broadcloth coat, fitted closely to his waist,
with a deep rolling collar; severe neckcloth, and a number of seals on
a stiff twill waistcoat. Veneada, as always, was carelessly garbed in
wrinkled silk and a broad planter's hat. It seemed to Alexander that the
other looked conspicuously older than he had only a few months back; the
doctor's face was pendulous, the pouches beneath his eyes livid.
Alexander Hulings quickly forgot this in the immediate pressure of
manufacture. The younger Wishon, who had followed his father into
Alexander's service, now came down from the charcoal stacks in a great
sectional wagon drawn by six mules, collared in bells and red streamers.
The pigs were sledged in endless procession from Glory, and then from
a second furnace, to the forges that reached along the creek in each
direction from Tubal Cain. The latter was worked as vigorously as
possible, but Alexander conducted its finances in a separate, private
column; all the profit he banked to the credit of James Claypole. He did
this not from a sense of equity, but because of a deeper, more obscure
feeling, almost a superstition, that such acknowledgment of the absent
man's unwitting assistance was a safeguard of further good fortune.
The months fled with amazing rapidity; it seemed to him that one day the
ground was shrouded in snow, and on the next the dogwood was blooming.
No man in all his properties worked harder or through longer hours
than Alexander; the night shift at a forge would often see him standing
grimly in the lurid reflections of the hearths; charcoal burners, eating
their flitch and potatoes on an outlying mountain, not infrequently
heard the beat of his horse's hoofs on the soft moss, his domineering
voice bullying them for some slight oversight. He inspired everywhere
a dread mingled with grudging admiration; it was known that he forced
every possible ounce of effort from workman and beast.
Nevertheless, toward the end of the third summer of his success he
contracted a lingering fever, and he was positively commanded to leave
his labors for a rest and change. Wrapped in a shawl, he sat on the
porch of the house he had commenced building, on a rise overlooking the
eddying smoke of his industries, and considered the various places
that offered relaxation; he could go to the sea, at Long Branch, or to
Saratoga, the gayety and prodigality of which were famous.... But his
thought returned to his collapse four years before; he heard Veneada
counseling him to take the water of the Mineral Springs. He had been
too poor then for the Mineral; had he gone there, he would have arrived
unnoticed. By heaven, he would go there now! It was, he knew, less
fashionable than the other places; its day had been twenty, thirty years
before. But it represented once more his progress, his success; and, in
the company of his personal servant, his leather boxes strapped at the
back of his lightest road wagon, he set out the following morning.
Almost sixty miles of indifferent roads lay before him; and, though he
covered, in his weakened condition, far more than half the distance by
evening, he was forced to stay overnight at a roadside tavern. The
way was wild and led through narrow, dark valleys, under the shadow
of uninhabited ridges, and through swift fords. Occasionally he passed
great, slow Conestoga wagons, entrained for the West; leather-hooded,
ancient vehicles; and men on horses.
The wagon broke suddenly info the smooth, green valley that held the
Mineral Springs. Against a western mountain were grouped hotels; a
bridge, crossing a limpid stream; pointed kiosks in the Chinese taste;
and red gravel walks. The hotel before which Alexander stopped—a
prodigiously long, high structure painted white—had a deep porch across
its face with slender columns towering up unbroken to the roof and
festooned with trumpet flowers. A bell rang loudly for dinner; and there
was a colorful flow of crinoline over the porch, a perfumed flowery
stir, through which he impatiently made his way, followed by negro boys
with his luggage.
Within, the office was high and bare, with a sweeping staircase, and
wide doors opened on a lofty thronged dining room. Above, he was led
through interminable narrow corridors, past multitudinous closed doors,
to a closetlike room completely filled by a narrow bed, a chair, and a
corner washstand; this, with some pegs in the calcined wall and a bell
rope, completed the provisions for his comfort. His toilet was hurried,
for he had been warned that extreme promptness at meals was more than
desirable; and, again below, he was led by a pompous negro between long,
crowded tables to a place at the farther end. The din of conversation
and clatter of dishes were deafening. In the ceiling great connected
fans were languidly pulled by black boys, making a doubtful circulation.
His dinner was cold and absurdly inadequate, but the table claret was
palatable. And, after the isolation of Tubal Cain, the droves of festive
people absorbed him. Later, at the bar, he came across an acquaintance,
a railroad director, who pointed out to Alexander what notables were
present. There was an Englishman, a lord; there was Bartram Ainscough, a
famous gambler; there—Alexander's arm was grasped by his companion.
“See that man—no, farther—dark, in a linen suit? Well, that's Partridge
Sinnox, of New Orleans.” He grew slightly impatient at Hulings' look of
inquiry. “Never heard of him! Best-known pistol shot in the States. A
man of the highest honor. Will go out on the slightest provocation.” His
voice lowered. “He's said to have killed twelve—no less. His companion
there, from Louisiana too, never leaves him. Prodigiously rich:
canefields.”
Alexander Hulings looked with small interest at the dueller and his
associate. The former had a lean, tanned face, small black eyes that
held each a single point of light, and long, precise hands. Here,
Alexander thought, was another form of publicity, different from his
own. As always, his lips tightened in a faint contempt at pretensions
other than his, or threatening to his preëminence. Sinnox inspired none
of the dread or curiosity evident in his companion; and he turned from
him to the inspection of a Pennsylvania coal magnate.
The colonnade of the hotel faced another cultivated ridge, on which
terraced walks mounted to a pavilion at the crest; and there, through
the late afternoon, he rested and gazed down at the Springs or over to
the village beyond. Alexander was wearier than he had supposed; the iron
seemed suddenly insupportably burdensome; a longing for lighter, gayer
contacts possessed him. He wanted to enter the relaxations of the
Springs.
Dancing, he knew, was customary after supper; and he lingered over
a careful toilet—bright blue coat, tight black trousers, and flat,
glistening slippers, with a soft cambric ruffle. Alexander Hulings
surveyed his countenance in a scrap of mirror, and saw, with mingled
surprise and discontent, that he—like Veneada—bore unmistakable signs of
age, marks of strife and suffering; his whiskers had an evident silvery
sheen. Life, receding unnoticed, had set him at the verge of middle age.
But at least, he thought, his was not an impotent medial period; if,
without material success, he had unexpectedly seen the slightly drawn
countenance meeting him in the mirror, he would have killed himself.
He realized that coldly. He could never have survived an established
nonentity. As it was, descending the stairs to supper, immaculate and
disdainful, he was upheld by the memory of his accomplishments, his
widening importance, weight. He actually heard a whispered comment:
“Hulings, iron.”
VII
AFTER supper the furnishings of the dining room were swept aside by a
troop of waiters, while a number of the latter, with fiddles and comets,
were grouped on a table, over which a green doth had been spread. With
the inevitable scraping of strings and preliminary unattended dance,
a quadrille was formed. Alexander, lounging with other exactly garbed
males in the doorway, watched with secret envy the participants in the
figures gliding from one to another. As if from another life he recalled
their names; they were dancing Le Pantalon now; La Poulee would follow;
then the Pastorale and L'.té.
Above the spreading gauze, the tulle and glacé silks of the women,
immense candelabra of glass pendants and candles shone and glittered;
the rustle of crinoline, of light passing feet, sounded below the
violins and blown comets, the rich husky voices calling the changes of
the quadrille.
He was troubled by an obscure desire to be a center of interest, of
importance, for the graceful feminine world about him. Sinnox, the man
from New Orleans, was bowing profoundly to his partner; a figure broke
up into a general boisterous gallopading—girls, with flushed cheeks,
swinging curls, spun from masculine shoulder to shoulder. The dance
ended, and the floating, perfumed skirts passed him in a soft flood
toward the porch.
Without, the colonnade towered against a sky bright with stars; the
night was warm and still. Alexander Hulings was lonely; he attempted to
detain the acquaintance met in the bar, but the other, bearing a great
bouquet of rosebuds in a lace-paper cone, hurried importantly away. A
subdued barytone was singing: “Our Way Across the Mountain, Ho!” The
strains of a waltz, the Carlotta-Grisi, drifted out, and a number of
couples answered its invitation.
A group at the iron railing across the foot of the colonnade attracted
his attention by its excessive gayety. The center, he saw, was a young
woman, with smooth bandeaux and loops of black hair, and a goya lily
caught below her ear. She was not handsome, but her features were
animated, and her shoulders as finely white and sloping as an alabaster
vase.
It was not this that held his attention, but a sense of familiarity, a
feeling that he had seen her before. He walked past the group, without
plan, and, meeting her gaze, bowed awkwardly in response to a hesitating
but unmistakable smile of recognition. Alexander stopped, and she
imperiously waved him to join the number about her. He was in a cold
dread of the necessity of admitting, before so many, that he could not
recall her name; but obviously all that she desired was to swell the
circle of her admirers, for, beyond a second nod, she ignored him.
The Southerner was at her shoulder, maintaining a steady flow of
repartee, and Alexander envied him his assured presence, his dark,
distinguished appearance. The man who had been indicated as Sinnox'
companion stood by Hulings, and the latter conceived a violent prejudice
for the other's meager yellow face and spiderlike hand, employed with a
cheroot.
Alexander hoped that somebody would repeat the name of the girl who had
spoken to him. A woman did, but only in the contracted, familiar form
of Gisela.... Gisela—he had heard that too. Suddenly she affected to be
annoyed; she arched her fine brows and glanced about, her gaze falling
upon Alexander Hulings. Before he was aware of her movement a smooth
white arm was thrust through his; he saw the curve of a powdered cheek,
an elevated chin.
“Do take me out of this!” she demanded. “New Orleans molasses is—well,
too thick.”
Obeying the gentle pressure of her arm, he led her down the steps to
the graveled expanse below. She stopped by a figure of the Goddess of
Health, in filigree on mossy rocks, pouring water from an urn. Her
gown was glazed green muslin, with a mist of white tulle, shining with
particles of silver. The goya lily exhaled a poignant scent.
“I didn't really leave because of Mr. Sinnox,” she admitted; “a pin
was scratching, and I was devoured with curiosity to know who you were,
where I had met——”
Suddenly, in a flash of remembered misery, of bitter resentment, he
recognized her—Gisela, John Wooddrop's daughter. The knowledge pinched
at his heart with malicious fingers; the starry night, the music and
gala attire, his loneliness had betrayed him into an unusual plasticity
of being. He delayed for a long breath, and then said dryly: “I'm
Alexander Hullings.”
“Not——” she half cried, startled. She drew away from him, and her face
grew cold. In the silence that followed he was conscious of the flower's
perfume and the insistent drip of the water falling from the um. “But I
haven't met you at all,” she said; “I don't in the least know you.”
Her attitude was insolent, and yet she unconsciously betrayed a faint
curiosity. “I think you lacked delicacy to join my friends—to bring me
out here!”
“I didn't,” he reminded her; “you brought me.” Instantly he cursed such
clumsy stupidity. Her lower lip protruded disdainfully.
“Forgive me,” she said, dropping a curtsy, “but I needn't keep you.”
She swept away across the gravel and up the stairs to the veranda. It
was evident that the group had not separated; for almost immediately
there rose a concerted laughter, a palpable mockery, drifting out to
Alexander.
His face was hot, his hands clenched in angry resentment. More than
anything else, he shrank from being an object of amusement, of gibes. It
was necessary to his self-esteem to be met with grave appreciation.
This was his first experience of the keen assaults of social weapons,
and it inflicted on him an extravagant suffering. His instinct was to
retire farther into the night, only to return to his room when the hotel
was dark, deserted. But a second, stronger impulse sent him deliberately
after Gisela Wooddrop, up the veranda stairs, and rigidly past the group
gazing at him with curious mirth.
An oil flare fixed above them shone down on the lean, saturnine
countenance of Partridge Sinnox. The latter, as he caught Alexander
Hulings' gaze, smiled slightly.
That expression followed Alexander to his cramped room; it mocked him as
he viciously pulled at the bell rope, desiring his servant; it was borne
up to him on the faint strains of the violins. And in the morning it
clouded his entire outlook. Sinnox' smile expressed a contempt that
Alexander Hulings' spirit could not endure. From the first he had been
resentful of the Southerner's cheap prestige. He added the qualifying
word as he descended to breakfast.
Sinnox, as a dueller, roused Hulings' impatience; he had more than once
faced impromptu death—iron bars in the hands of infuriated employees,
and he had overborne them with a cold phrase. This theatrical playing
with pistols—cheap! Later, in the crowded bar, he was pressed elbow to
elbow with Sinnox and his companion; and he automatically and ruthlessly
cleared sufficient space for his comfort. Sinnox' associate said, in
remonstrance: “Sir, there are others—perhaps more considerable.”
“Perhaps!” Alexander Hulings carelessly agreed. Sinnox gazed down on him
with narrowed eyes. “I see none about us,” he remarked, “who would have
to admit the qualification.”
Alexander's bitterness increased, became aggressive. He met Sinnox' gaze
with a stiff, dangerous scorn:
“In your case, at least, it needn't stand.”
“Gentlemen,” the third cried, “no more, I beg of you.” He grasped
Alexander Hulings' arm. “Withdraw!” he advised. “Mr. Sinnox' temper is
fatal. Beyond a certain point it cannot be leashed. It has caused great
grief. Gentlemen, I beg——”
“Do you mean——” Sinnox demanded, and his face was covered by an even,
dark flush to the sweep of his hair.
“Cheap!” Alexander's voice was sudden and unpremeditated.
The other's temper rose in a black passion; he became so enraged that
his words were mere unintelligible gasps. His hand shook so that he
dropped a glass of rock-and-rye splintering on the floor. “At once!” he
finally articulated. “Scurvy——”
“This couldn't be helped,” his companion proclaimed, agitated. “I warned
the other gentleman. Mr. Sinnox is not himself in a rage, his record is
well known. He was elbowed aside by——”
“Alexander Hulings!” that individual pronounced.
He was aware of the gaze of the crowding men about him; already he
was conscious of an admiration roused by the mere fact of his facing a
notorious bully. Cheap! The director joined him.
“By heavens, Hulings, you're in dangerous water. I understand you have
no family.”
“None!” Alexander stated curtly.
Illogically he was conscious of the scent of a goya lily. Sinnox was
propelled from the bar, and his friend reappeared and conferred with the
director.
“At once!” Hulings heard the former announce. “Mr. Sinnox...
unbearable!”
“Have you a case of pistols?” the director asked. “Mr. Sinnox offers
his. I believe there is a quiet opening back of the bathhouse. But my
earnest advice to you is to withdraw; you will be very little blamed;
this man is notorious, a professional fighter. You have only to say——”
Cheap! Alexander thought again, fretful at having been involved in such
a ridiculous affair. He was even more deliberate than usual; but, though
he was certain of his entire normality, the faces about him resembled
small, bobbing balloons.
Alexander finished his drink—surprised to find himself still standing by
the bar—and silently followed the director through the great hall of the
hotel out on to the veranda, and across the grass to a spot hidden from
the valley by the long, low bulk of the bathing house.
Sinnox and his companion, with a polished mahogany box, were already
there; a small, curious group congregated in the distance. Sinnox'
friend produced long pistols with silken-brown barrels and elegantly
carved ivory stocks, into which he formally rammed powder and balls.
Alexander Hulings was composed; but his fingers were cold, slightly
numb, and he rubbed them together angrily. Not for an instant did he
think that he might be killed; other curious, faint emotions assailed
him—long-forgotten memories of distant years; Veneada's kindly hand on
his shoulder; the mule called Alexander because of its aptitude for hard
labor; John Wooddrop's daughter.
He saw that the pistols had been loaded; their manipulator stood with
them, butts extended, in his grasp. He began a preamble of customary
explanation, which he ended by demanding, for his principal, an apology
from Alexander Hulings. The latter, making no reply, was attracted by
Sin-nox' expression of deepening passion; the man's face, he thought,
positively was black. Partridge Sinnox' entire body was twitching with
rage.... Curious, for a seasoned, famous dueller!
Suddenly Sinnox, with a broken exclamation, swung on his heel, grasped
one of the pistols in his second's hands, and discharged it point-blank
at Alexander Hulings.
An instant confused outcry rose. Alexander heard the term “Insane!”
pronounced, as if in extenuation, by Sinnox' friend. The latter held the
remaining, undischarged pistol out of reach; the other lay on the ground
before Partridge Sinnox. Alexander's face was as grey as granite.
“That was the way he did it,” he unconsciously pronounced aloud.
He wondered slowly at the fact that he had been unhit. Then, with his
hand in a pocket, he walked stiffly up to within a few feet of Sinnox,
and produced a small, ugly derringer, with one blunt barrel on top of
the other.