[From Helen's Diary.]
_June 5, 18--._ Received a short note from Edgar at noon. It was a
peculiar, unnatural note in some respects. It seemed a mechanical
affair, instead of an impulse of the heart. He did not call this
evening. _I am much worried_ over it.
_June 6, 18--._ Edgar is just now gone. This morning I received a note
from him as usual, saying that he had secured a cottage just at the edge
of town for us. He called at eight. He was in the wildest spirits. I
have never seen him in this way before. His happiness infected me. He
has had a wonderful stroke of good fortune, by which he has come into
the proprietorship of the _Enterprise_, as well as the editorship, and
he has just engaged in a land speculation--which I am not to
mention--that is going to be worth a fortune to him,--something about a
railroad grant, or _something_. I don't understand it exactly.
The cottage has seven rooms, and we are going to furnish them _all_. Ed
laughed, and observed that he had already reached the linen collar
period of his existence. There was a certain grim ring in his laugh
to-night. I feel anything but grim. My entire person feels like a
perpetual smile of joy. This stroke of fortune is glorious. Ed said that
I must say absolutely nothing about affairs. That he had some people in
his hands, and that we must be very discreet. I can't bear _discretion_.
It always seems to suggest something to be ashamed of. Of course, it
doesn't in this instance, because Edgar is the one who enjoins it. There
is something glorious in this feeling of absolute faith. To _know_ that
for the rest of my life I shall never know the responsibility of having
to decide _anything_. To know that I can place myself entirely in his
hands, and be confident of always being counselled aright. I could never
have loved him if I could not have felt this. It is my temperament. I do
not feel this because I love him, but I love him because of this
feeling. A good and honorable man--a man above the petty meanness of his
fellows--inspires one almost with reverence.
There is a certain magnificent assurance of superiority in Edgar Braine,
so that at times the thought of his marriage with a woman like me seems
almost outrageous. I feel so inferior, morally and intellectually. I
fear being a drag upon him; an obstacle in the road of his advancement.
I am determined to keep up with him as far as it lies in my power. He
said to-night that he lived for but two things--power, and my love. I
can satisfy the latter, and will never hinder the former. I realize how
dear this wish for power is to him; how he longs to be able to better
the condition of those people whom he comes in contact with. His ideas
are constantly broadening. To-night he talked a little wildly, but in a
tone and with a manner that in some way carried conviction with it, of
becoming a power not only among his immediate associates but among the
people in general; a power in the nation.
When I think of the noble aims of this man that I love, I cannot help
feeling that such a situation would vastly benefit the country. With
such a spirit at the helm, there could be no danger of wreck. Heigho!
What speculations.
I found myself smiling at the absurdity of my thoughts just now. If I
believed that such a thing could be, I should not be so supremely happy
as I am now. I could sacrifice my feelings, if it were to the interests
of the country, or Edgar. I should even enjoy sacrificing them, I think.
But there will never be any question of that. It seems to me that all
has come to the point that I have longed for. We are to be married;
never separated; live comfortably, without the necessity for anxiety as
to the practical things of life, and love each other unmolested by
anyone or anything. This is absolute and perfect happiness. To love and
live with no ambition save to do right, and feel that the world may be a
little better for two loving people having lived in it.
When I teased Ed to-night about not taking me to New York for our
wedding trip, he actually looked unhappy, and as though he thought I
meant it. It made me laugh to see the miserable expression on his face
for a moment, when I have been thanking Heaven all this time that we
could not afford to go further than Chicago, and so would get back here
to Thebes and our little home in half the time. Besides, I hate
travelling. It covers me with dust till I feel as if I could never be
clean again. The dust seems to get even into my mind and soul. It isn't
so with Edgar. There is a halo of immaculateness about him: cleanliness
is in the very atmosphere when he is near. He is absolutely an
indescribable man. He walks down the street, and if one but gets a
glimpse of his shiny coat-tails rounding the corner, one is impressed
with the superiority of the manner those coat-tails have of rounding
that corner. One _knows_ that they belong to a man who is worth knowing.
One would be impressed that the proprietor of those shiny coat-tails had
accomplished some great thing.
If I don't stop right here, I shall get to elaborating on this subject
until I shall not get to bed at all.
Good night, Edgar. I hold up my face to be kissed.
_June 19th._ I have not written in this diary for days. There has been
plenty to write about--plenty of emotions, not many incidents.
Edgar has reached what, to me, seems the pinnacle of fame and
honor--though he only laughs when I say so, and says, with almost a
touch of contempt in his tone--"Wait!"
I am a thousand times more elated over the situation than he is--and yet
I hardly know whether I am quite as happy as I was before, or not. When
I am overwhelmed with exaltation and admiration for his wonderful
achievements, Edgar smiles indulgently, and the other night he turned
suddenly and said:
"Listen, dear! When I was a young boy, I used to become frenzied at
times with certain indignities that other boys with only half my brains
compelled me to endure, because they happened to be situated more
advantageously than I as regards material things. While I had perfect
contempt for them, I felt a wild desire to convince them of my
superiority, as I was convinced of it. I decided that brute force was
the only thing at my command at first, and one morning, went out and
whipped that one of them whose prestige was such in the town that
victory over him meant reverence for me from the rest in the set. It was
this very respect which I had whipped the fellow to gain, and which
these little ruffians accorded me afterward, that disgusted me. I found
I didn't value the respect of a lot of little loafers who could
appreciate superiority of that kind only. That evening, when I saw my
mother patching those clothes that had been torn in the fight, I
discovered that there was no longer even the flavor of satisfaction left
me. I said then, 'I will adopt a larger plan.' I did. I had then no
thought that--that just this would be the outcome," and here he looked
out of the window for a time, with the strange, determined, ominous
look that I have seen in his face so often lately.
"But the situation is more than my--wildest dreams could have
anticipated."
Here he laughed. His laugh, too, has changed a little lately. He went on
in a sort of abstracted tone. "And what that first brutal success was to
me, now is this that enthuses you so. Like that first success it has,
from the very fact of its unsatisfactory character, urged and assured
greater achievements. I think of it as paltry, inconsequential--from my
present point of view. It is only a means by which to accomplish great
things, things worthy of achievement--as most people regard worthiness.
"The present is nothing to me, absolutely nothing, except so far as it
affects the future."
Then he fell into one of his little silent moments, of which he has so
many now. There is something about it all that makes me feel strange and
hysterical. I am so proud of him that I want to cry out on the street
corners that this man belongs to me--and yet there is something lacking.
He is with me even more than usual, for it seems as though he has sudden
plans and constantly occurring things to tell me about.
He always says: "Be discreet; never speak to your Aunt or anyone but me
of any of these things. They are just between us." He says that I am
remarkably trustworthy, and that he could not live if he could not tell
me about how things are going. He never seems to think of himself. He
will sit for ten minutes looking at me without speaking, and suddenly
say:
"Wait, wait! Just a little time and everything shall be yours. I will
bring the world to you and lay it at your feet," and when he says it I
almost believe it to be true for a moment.
It is only because his nerves are overwrought. (He is nervous to the
verge of insanity sometimes.) It seems to me that I am the only one in
the world who could possibly understand his temperament. He says I am.
The other night we were at a small reception given by Mrs. Clews. He
walked about the house all the time I was putting on my things. I knew
that he was so nervous and excited over something that he could hardly
control himself.
When we reached the Clews's he suddenly became another man. For an hour
and a half he was calm almost to coldness. He was magnificent. Mr.
Hildreth was there, and once while Edgar and I were talking together we
saw him near us. Edgar had taken me a little aside, and was saying
nothing, but allowing himself to relax for a moment from the strain
under which I knew he was keeping himself. Suddenly he saw Mr. Hildreth,
and his tone and attitude and manner changed completely. Where he had
seemed almost like a tired, petulant child looking for comfort from me,
he suddenly changed to a stern, masterful man without a trace of
helplessness or nervousness.
He said: "This is as good a time as any," and excused himself and went
over to Hildreth, and touched his arm. It seemed to me that Mr. Hildreth
was positively deferential to him. It was no doubt my imagination, but
they disappeared for a while, and when they returned, Edgar and I left.
He was his usual self--the self that others know, until we were outside.
Then he became silent--preoccupied. I asked him what he wanted with Mr.
Hildreth, and he laughed and said:
"A little matter of business--technicalities that you could not
understand." There is a great deal that I cannot understand, and these
things he never tells me about, because he says that if he annoyed me
with these dry details, I would not listen to him at all by and bye. As
though that were true!
When we reached home, he suddenly took me in his arms, and said: "How
glorious you are! It would be nothing to me if you were not to share it
with me."
He talks in such a wild fashion at times. I suppose he means all this
honor and attention that he receives. Since it has become certain that
his exertions are to carry through the railroad affair to the advantage
of Thebes, he seems to have become a sort of god with the Thebans. I
don't understand the business part of it very well, but I know that
every one thinks that he has done a great thing for the town. When I
speak of the gratitude that the people of Thebes should feel, he shrugs
his shoulders and changes the subject. Once, he said in a sort of a
passion:--"For heaven's sake never speak again of anything I seem to
have done for Thebes."
This sensitiveness and modesty are constant with him in everything that
he does--though the trait seems to be intensified now.
The other day I stopped at the office and some man was in there talking
to Edgar, and said something about his being a public benefactor, and
Edgar said, coldly:
"Don't be grateful too soon, my dear fellow," and when he saw me, his
whole face lighted up, and he dismissed the man.
The man stared at me as he went out, and suddenly Edgar looked like a
thunder cloud, and slipped between us a sort of improvised screen for
me. He said after the door had closed:
"I don't want you to come to the office any more--things are a little
different now."
They are different because he has grown to thinking of the effect of
everything on other people now, instead of just ourselves, as he always
has done. He has always said:
"As long as one has a clear conscience, and is satisfied with one's
self, the opinions of other people are of little consequence."
I don't feel quite comfortable with the change, but he reminded me that
circumstances alter cases; that one must adapt himself to changed
situations. I asked him if it was quite right, and he looked at me a
long time, and finally said with the old, new determination in his face
and voice: "_We are to do it_," without answering my question. Somehow
it taught me a lesson. I think I shall never again question anything
that he says. His tone, his manner seemed to forbid it, seemed to settle
forever any doubt as to a possibility of anything being wrong that he
says or decides.
I was almost astonished at myself afterwards, when I realized that I
_had_ questioned any motive he might have had, or any suggestion he
might have made. A woman like me, questioning the propriety of anything
that such a man as Edgar Braine might do!
Sometimes I try to make up my mind whether he looked more magnificent in
his shiny coat with fringed bindings, or in his present immaculate
toilet. I can come to no conclusion. The reverence and awe that Edgar
Braine inspired in his shabby suit were overwhelming. The dignity that
he lends to his present clothes is--well, is simply glorious. He makes
the clothes. In either case, one is impressed that clothes are but a
matter of convenience, and really of too little importance to be
remembered--except long enough to put them on and take them off--by
Edgar Braine. Such a man as he would be perfect in any clothes.