THE PENALTY
I
The billboards of Paris broke into universal ecstasy: “Schmolsky-Superba
Présente l’Etoile Américaine, Viola Tracy, dans La Couche d’Or,
Cinéma-Mélodrame de la Société en Huit Reels.” There were pages in the
newspapers, “Premiere Production sur le Continent d’Europe”—Schmolsky
was doing the job in style. “L’Etoile” herself was coming, all the way
from California; and Bunny motored to Havre to meet her, and oh, how
happy they were, a second honeymoon, with the old disharmonies
forgotten. He drove her back to Paris—no, almost to Paris, she must
board a train outside the city and make her entrance according to
schedule announced in the newspapers. There were the shouting thousands,
the cameras, and the reporters, including those whose duty it would be
to cable the stirring news back to New York and Angel City.
The world grows one, and it is the “cinéma-mélodrame de la Société” that
is doing it—which is to say the world grows American. The premiere here
in Paris was the same as a premiere in Hollywood, except that the crowd
made more noise, and sought to embrace its idol, actually imperilling
the idol’s life. There was a double reason for excitement, because the
man who had played the leading part was no common movie actor, but a
real prince from Roumania, who had been visiting in Southern California,
and had yielded to the wiles of Schmolsky and become a star for a night.
Now here he was in person, on his way home to Roumania—having traveled
on the train and the steamer with Vee, so Bunny learned. A tall, lean
young man, not very handsome, but used to attention; courteous, but
easily bored, wearing a quizzical smile, and reluctant to be
serious—until he heard Bunny express some sympathy with the murderous
and blasphemous reds! After that, he preferred the company of Bunny’s
sister.
When the Paris premiere was over, Dad got him a touring car of royal
proportions, and they motored to Berlin, Bunny driving, with Vee by his
side, and Dad on the back seat with his secretary and a chauffeur for
emergencies. It was all just as grand as their tour to New York; perfect
roads, beautiful scenery, humble peasantry standing cap in hand and
awe-stricken, servants rushing to wait upon them at every stop. All
Europe owes us money, and this is how it pays.
And then Berlin—“Erste Auffuehrung in Deutschland, Schmolsky-Superba
ankuendigt,” etc. And the crowds and the cameras and the reporters—the
world was one. This had been enemy country less than six years ago; but
did any ex-soldiers in uniform take station at the theatre entrance, and
forbid American films to set too high a standard for the native product?
They did not; and Bunny smiled, remembering his remark to Schmolsky,
“Vae victis!” and the latter’s reply, “Huh?”
They went on to Vienna. It is a poor city now, and hardly repays the
advertising; but there is still magic in the name, and it counts with
the newspapers. So here was another premiere, less noisy but more
genial. Vee and her lover were a little bored now; she had had the last
great “kick” that she could get out of life. When a star has had her
continental tour, and has got tired of it, she is an old-timer, blasée
and world-weary, and life from then on is merely one thing after
another.
The person with gift of perennial childhood was Dad. He enjoyed each
premiere as if he had never seen the others, and he would have liked to
go on to Bucharest, where her majesty the queen—herself a genius at
advertising—was to attend the first showing, in honor of Prince
Marescu. But another attraction kept Dad in Vienna—the spooks had
followed him! His friend, Mrs. Olivier had given him a letter to a
wonderful medium, and they went to a seance, and Vee was told all about
the patent medicine vendor who had raised her in a wagon—the very
phrases this man had used to the crowd. By golly, if it was a trick, it
was certainly a clever one!
II
There was only one cloud on this second honeymoon, and Bunny kept it
hidden in his own soul. There were “youth” papers in both Berlin and
Vienna, and he considered himself bound to call at their offices and
invite the rebel editors to lunch, and send home letters for Rachel to
publish. In Vienna was a paper in the English language devoted to the
defense of political prisoners; it was a Communist paper, but so well
camouflaged that Bunny didn’t realize the fact, and anyhow, he would
have wished to meet the editors. He was still making his pitiful attempt
to understand both sides—even here in Central Europe, where the
Socialists and the Communists had many times been at open war.
In this obscure office in a working-class part of the city Bunny came
upon a ghastly experience. There was exhibited to him a creature that
had once been a young man, but now was little more than a skeleton
covered with a skin of greenish-yellow. It had only one eye and one ear,
and it could not speak because its tongue had been pulled out or cut
off, and most of its front teeth had been extracted, and its cheeks were
pitted with holes made by cigarettes burned into it. Likewise all the
creatures’ finger-nails had been torn out, and its hands burned with
holes; the men in the office bared its shirt, and showed Bunny how the
flesh had been ripped and torn by lashes this way and that, like
cross-hatchings in a pen and ink drawing.
This was a prisoner escaped from a Roumanian dungeon, and these scars
represented the penalty of refusal to betray his comrades to the White
Terror. Here in this office were photographs and letters and
affidavits—for this kind of thing was being done to thousands of men
and women in Roumania. The government was in the hands of a band of
ruling class thugs, who were stealing everything in sight, selling the
natural resources of the country; one of the biggest of Roumanian oil
fields had just been leased to an American syndicate, possibly Comrade
Ross had heard of that? And Comrade Ross said that he had. He didn’t add
that his father was in on the deal!
This victim of the White Terror was from Bessarabia, a province taken
from Russia under the blessed principle of self-determination. It was
inhabited by Russian peasants, and the natural struggles of these people
for freedom were met by slaughtering or torturing to death not merely
everyone who revolted, but everyone who expressed sympathy with the
revolt. Nor was this a sporadic thing, it was the condition prevailing
all along the Russian border, a thousand miles from the Baltic to the
Black Sea. All these provinces and countries, inhabited by Russian
peasants, had been taken from the reds and given to the whites. And so
you had this situation—on the Eastern side of the line the peasants had
the land and the government, they were free men and women, making a
civilization of workers; while on the other side they were serfs at the
mercy of landlords, robbed of the fruits of their toil, and beaten or
shot if they ventured a murmur. It was impossible to prevent peasants
from one side crossing to the other; and the contrast between the two
civilizations was so plain that no child could fail to understand it. So
the class struggle went on all the time, a hideous civil war, of which
no word was allowed to leak to the outside world.
Left to themselves, this landlord aristocracy could not survive a year.
But they had world capital behind them; they got the munitions with
which to do the slaughtering, or the money to make the munitions, from
American big business. Yes, it was America which kept alive this White
Terror, in order to collect interest on the debts, and to come in and
buy up the country—the railroads, the mines, the oil fields, even the
great castles and landed estates. Would not Comrade Ross tell the
American people what bloody work their money was doing?
Bunny went away with the question on his conscience. Would he tell, or
wouldn’t he? Would he begin by telling his darling of the world? Would
he mention that the young Prince Marescu, whom she so greatly admired,
was the son of one of the bloodiest of these ruling class thugs?
All the time Bunny was driving his darling through winding passes amid
the glorious snow-covered mountains of Switzerland, he was not happy as
it was his duty to be. He would have long periods of brooding, and she
would ask, what was the matter, and he would evade. But then she would
pin him down—being shrewd, like most women where love is concerned. “Is
it those reds you’ve been visiting?” He said, “Yes, dear, but let’s not
talk about it—it isn’t going to make any difference to us.” She
answered, ominously, “It is going to make all the difference in the
world to us!”
III
Back in Paris, and there were long letters from Verne; the government
had filed suit for the return of its oil lands, and the Sunnyside tract
was in the hands of a receiver, and all the development stopped. But
they were not to worry—their organization would be put to work on the
various foreign concessions, and as for the money, what they were
getting out of Paradise would keep them in old age.
Strange to say, Dad worried scarcely at all. Mrs. Olivier had discovered
a new medium, even more wonderful than the others, and this Polish
peasant woman with bad teeth and epilepsy had brought up from the depths
of the universal consciousness the spirit of Dad’s grandfather, who had
crossed the continent in a covered wagon and perished in the Mohave
desert; also there was the spirit of an Indian chief whom the old
pioneer had killed during the journey. Most fascinating to listen while
the two warriors told about this early war between the reds and the
whites!
Bertie was furious, of course; she didn’t dare say much to Dad, for the
old man was still the boss, and would tell her “where to get off.” She
took it out on Bunny, storming at him, because he was the one who might
have saved Dad from this dangerous vamp. Bunny couldn’t help laughing,
because Mrs. Olivier was so far from the type which the Hollywood
directors had taught him to recognize: a stoutish, elderly lady, sweet
and sentimental, with a soft, caressing voice—it was too funny to
listen to her coo to the fierce and surly Indian chief, “Now, Red Wolf
in the Rain, are you going to be nice to us this evening? We are so glad
to hear you again! Captain Ross’s little grandson is here, and wants you
to tell us if the faces of the redmen are white in your happy world.”
Bunny was taking Vee about to see Paris; a city which was exhibiting to
the world the moral collapse of capitalist imperialism. In the theatres
of this culture centre you might see a stage crowded with naked women,
their bodies painted every color of the rainbow; some of them died of
the poisoning which this treatment inflicted upon the system, but
meantime the war for democracy was justified. While Bunny was there, the
artists of the city took offense because the managers of the underground
railway objected to an obscene advertisement; to express their scorn of
censorship, some hundreds of men and women emerged at dawn, having torn
off their clothing in drunken orgies, and invaded the subway cars
entirely naked. These beauty-creators and guides of the future held a
festival once every year, the Quatres Arts Ball, a famous event to which
Vee, as a visiting artist, was welcome; and here, when the revels were
at their height, you might stroll about a vast hall, and see, upon
platforms set against the walls, the actual enactment of every variety
of abnormal vice which human degeneracy had been able to conceive.
With the time he had left from such diversions, Bunny was preparing for
“The Young Student” a moving protest against the Roumanian White Terror.
He left this nearly completed manuscript on the writing table in his
hotel room, and when he came back it was gone, and inquiries among the
hotel staff brought no information. Two days later Bertie came to him
with another tantrum; she knew all the contents of his manuscript, and
what shame he was bringing upon their heads! “So Eldon’s been setting
spies on me!” exclaimed Bunny, ready to get hot himself; but Bertie,
said rubbish, Eldon had nothing to do with it, it was the French secret
service. Did he imagine for a moment the government was failing to keep
track of Bolshevik propaganda? Or that they would let him use their
country as a centre of plotting against the peace of Europe?
Bunny wanted to know, were they so silly as to imagine they could keep
him from writing home what he had learned in Vienna? He would do the
article over, and find ways to get it to America in spite of all the
spies. Then Bertie actually broke down and wept; of all countries for
him to pick out—Roumania! Here she had been pulling wires to get Eldon
appointed to a high diplomatic post, with the combined influence of
Verne in Washington and Prince Marescu in Bucharest; and now Bunny came
along and smeared them with his filth!
And more than that! Blind fool, couldn’t he see that Marescu was
interested in Vee? Did he want to give her up to him? The prince would
of course hear about this matter through the French government, which
was arming Roumania against Russia. Suppose he were to come back to
Paris and challenge Bunny to a duel? The young smart-aleck answered,
“We’ll fight with tennis rackets!”
IV
Matters came to a climax. A letter for Bunny, bearing a French stamp,
but in a familiar handwriting that made his pulses jump. He tore it open
and read: “Dear Son, I am in town for a few days and would you like to
meet me? Yours for old times, Paul Watkins.”
Bunny was twenty-four years old now, but it was just the way it had been
eleven years ago, there in Mrs. Groarty’s back yard, when he had left
his father and run shouting, “Paul! Paul! Where are you? Please don’t go
way!” Bunny had a date with Vee, but he got out of it—his sister would
invite her to one of those diplomatic tea-parties where you met the
Prince de This and the Duchesse de That. Then Bunny hurried off to the
obscure hotel where his friend was staying.
Paul was haggard; one does not take a trip to Moscow to get fat. But his
sober face was shining with a light of fanaticism—the same thing which
his brother Eli called the glory of the Lord! Dad would have said there
were two of them, equally crazy; but it didn’t seem that way to Bunny,
who mocked at Eli’s god, but believed in Paul’s—at least enough to
tremble in his presence. Paul had been living under a workers’
government again—and this time not as a wage-slave, a strike-breaker in
army uniform, but as a free man, and master of the future. So now in
this dingy hotel room Bunny was sitting opposite an apostle; Paul, with
his sombre, determined features and toil-accustomed figure, the very
incarnation of the militant working-class!
And the miracles of which he had to tell were real. First of all a
spiritual miracle—a hundred million people proclaiming their own
sovereignty, and the downfall of masters and exploiters, kings, priests,
capitalists, the whole rabble of parasites. It was a physical miracle,
too, because these hundred million people controlled one-sixth of the
earth’s surface, and were building a new civilization, a model for the
future. They were poor, of course; they had started with a country in
wreck. But what were a few years, and a little hunger, compared with the
ages of torment they had survived?
Paul described the sights of Moscow. First of all, the youth movement; a
whole new generation being taught to be clear-eyed and free, to face the
facts of nature, and to serve the working-class, instead of climbing out
upon its face and founding a line of parasites! You saw those young
Communists in class-rooms, on athletic fields, in the streets—marching,
singing, listening to speeches—Paul himself had talked to tens of
thousands, in his little bit of Russian, and nothing had ever meant so
much to him. He had but one interest for the rest of his life, to tell
the young workers of America about the young workers of Russia. He began
by telling Bunny!
He talked about the councils he had attended, the international
gatherings where the future of the parties all over the world was
charted out. Bunny of course made his protest against this. Did Paul
really think it was possible for an American political party to have its
course determined in a foreign country? Paul smiled and said it was hard
enough—the Russian leaders couldn’t understand how far back in history
America stood. But what else could you do? Either you meant to have
world order, or you didn’t? If you left the party in each country to
determine its own course, you were right back where you were before the
war, with men calling themselves Socialists, and holding power in the
name of Socialism, who were in reality patriots, ready to back the
exploiters of their own land in wars against the exploiters of other
lands.
That was the thing which threatened to destroy the human race; and the
only way to end it was to do what the Third International was
doing—have a world government and enforce its orders. The workers’
world government was located in Moscow, because elsewhere the delegates
would be thrown into prison, or assassinated, as in Geneva. But before
many years the Third International would hold a Congress in Berlin, and
then in Paris and London, and in the end in New York. The workers of the
world would send their representatives, and that Congress would give its
orders, and the nations would stop their fighting, just you bet! Thus
Paul: and Bunny, as usual, was swept along upon a wave of enthusiasm.
V
There were so many things Bunny wanted to know about. He took Paul to
dinner, in an outdoor café, and they spent a good part of the evening,
French fashion, conversing there. Paul told about the schools; all the
new educational discoveries that had been made in America, but could
only be applied in Russia. And the papers and books—the modern,
progressive writers being translated and spread over the half of two
continents. And industry—the colossal labors of a people to build a
modern world out of nothing, with no capital and no help from the
outside. Paul described the oil industry under this Soviet system; a
state trust, in which the workers’ unions were recognized, and given a
voice in labor affairs. The workers published papers, they had clubs and
dramatic societies, a new culture, based upon industry instead of
exploitation.
Then, of course, Bunny wanted to know about Ruth, and about Paul’s
arrest and his trial, and what was he going to do now. He was on his way
back to America, and would probably be put to organizing in California,
because that was the place he knew best. He had been in Paradise and
held secret meetings with the men; until at last he had been found out
and put off the tract—the place where he had been born, and had lived
nearly all his life! But that was all right, the party had a “nucleus,”
as it was called, in the field, and literature was being distributed and
read.
Bunny told what he had learned in Vienna, and how his article on
Roumania had been stolen; Paul said that in every European capital there
were more spies than there were lice. Very probably there was some agent
sitting at one of these tables, trying to hear what they said. His
baggage was rifled every few days. The imbecile governments, trying to
crush the workers’ movement—and at the same time piling up their
munitions, getting ready for the next war, that would make Bolshevism as
inevitable as the sunrise!
“You really think there’ll be another war, Paul?”
The other laughed. “Ask your eminent brother-in-law! He’ll know.”
“But he wouldn’t tell me. We barely speak.”
Paul answered that armaments produce wars automatically; the capitalists
who make the armaments have to see that they are used, in order to get
to make more. Bunny said that the idea of another war seemed too
horrible to think about; and Paul replied, “So you don’t think about it,
and that makes it easy for the business men to get it ready.”
He sat for a bit in thought, and then went on, “Since I’ve been
travelling in Europe, I find myself remembering that night when you and
I met for the first time. Do you recollect it, son?”
When Bunny said that he did, Paul went on, “I wasn’t in my aunt’s
living-room, and I didn’t see those people that had come to lease their
lots; but I listened outside and heard the wrangling; and now, as I go
about Europe I say to myself, that is world diplomacy. A wrangle over an
oil lease! Every nation hating every other one, making combinations and
promising to stick together—but they’ve sold each other out before
night, and there’s no lie that any one hasn’t told, and no crime they
haven’t committed. You remember that row?”
How well Bunny remembered! Miss Snypp—he hadn’t known her name, but her
face rose before him, brick-red with wrath. “Let me tell you, you’ll
never get me to put my signature on that paper—never in this world!”
And Mr. Hank, the man with the hatchet-face, shouting, “Let me tell you,
the law will make you sign it”—only there was no law in European
diplomacy! And Mrs. Groarty, Paul’s aunt, glaring at Mr. Hank and
clenching her hands as if she had him by the throat. “And you the feller
that was yellin’ for the rights of the little lots! You was for sharin’
and sharin’ alike—you snake in the grass!”
Said Paul: “Those people were so blind with greed, they were willing to
throw away their own chances for the satisfaction of beating the others.
They did that, I think you told me—threw away the lease with your
father. And everybody in the field behaved the same way. I wonder if you
happen to know, it’s government statistics on that Prospect Hill
field—more money was spent in drilling than ever was taken out in oil!”
“Yes, of course,” said Bunny. “I’ve seen derricks there with platforms
actually touching.”
“Each one racing to get the oil, and spending more than he makes—isn’t
that a picture of capitalism? And then the war! You remember how we
heard the racket, and ran to the window, and there was one fellow
hitting the next fellow in the nose, and the whole roomful milling
about, shouting and trying to stop the fight, or to get into it!”
“One said, ‘You dirty, lying yellow skunk!’ And the other said, ‘Take
that, you white-livered puppy!’”
“Son, that was a little oil war! And a year or two later the big one
broke out, and if there’s anything you don’t understand about it, all
you need is to think about what happened in my aunt’s home. And
remember, they were fighting for a chance to exploit the oil workers, to
divide the wealth the oil workers were going to produce; in their crazy
greed they killed or injured seventy-three percent of all the men they
put to work on Prospect Hill—that’s government statistics also! And
don’t you see how that’s the world war exactly? The workers doing the
fighting, and the bankers getting the bonds!”
VI
So many things to talk about! Bunny told the story of Eli, concerning
which Paul had heard no rumor. The latter said it was easy to
understand, because Eli always had been a chaser after women. It was one
reason Paul had been so repelled by his brother’s preaching. “I wouldn’t
mind his having his girl,” he said, “only he denies my right to my girl.
He preaches a silly ideal of asceticism, and then goes off secretly and
does what he pleases.”
Here was an opportunity for which Bunny had been seeking. He took a
sudden plunge. “Paul, there’s something I want to tell you. For the past
three years I’ve been living with a moving picture actress.”
“I know,” said Paul; “Ruth told me.”
“Ruth!”
“Yes, she saw something about it in the papers,” And then, reading his
friend’s thought, Paul added, “Ruth has had to learn that the world is
the way it is, and not the way she’d like it to be.”
“What do you think about such things, Paul?”
“Well, son, it’s a question of how you feel about the girl. If you
really love her, and she loves you, why, I suppose it’s all right. Are
you happy?”
“We were at first; we still are, part of the time. The trouble is, she
hates the radical movement. She doesn’t really understand it, of
course.”
Paul answered, “Some people hate the radical movement because they don’t
understand it, and some because they do.” After Bunny had had time to
digest that, he went on, “Either you’ll have to change your ideas, or
you’ll have a break with the girl. That’s something I’m sure about—you
can’t have happiness in love unless it’s built on harmony of ideas.
Otherwise you quarrel all the time—or at least, you’re bored.”
“Have you ever lived with a woman, Paul?”
“There was a girl I was very much attracted to in Angel City, and I
could have had her, I guess. But it was a couple of years ago, when I
saw that I was going Bolshevik, and I knew she wouldn’t stand for it, so
what was the use? You get yourself tangled up in a lot of emotions, and
waste the time you need for work.”
“I’ve often wondered about you and such things. You used to think the
way Eli talks, when we first met.”
Paul laughed. “I’d hardly keep my Christian superstitions when I became
a Communist organizer. No, son; what I think is, find a woman you really
love, and that wants to share your work, and that you mean to stick by;
then you can love her, you don’t need any priest to give you permission.
Some day I suppose I’ll meet a woman comrade—I think about it a good
deal, of course—I’m no wooden post. But I’ll have to wait and see what
happens at my trial. I’d be little use to a girl if I’ve got to spend
twenty years in Leavenworth or Atlanta!”
VII
Paul was going to speak at a meeting of Communists the next evening, and
Bunny must go to that meeting, of course. But what was he to do with
Vee? She would not be interested in hearing Paul tell about Russia; she
had learned all about it from her friend, Prince Marescu. Bunny
bethought him of Dad and the seances, and by tactful manipulation he
caused the old gentleman to call up Vee and tell her about an especially
interesting seance they were going to have that evening. Vee promised to
come, and Bunny thought he was free.
But then about lunch-time Bertie called him on the phone. “So your old
Paul is in Paris!”
Bunny was startled; having thought he was keeping a secret. Then he
laughed. “So your old secret service has been at work!”
Said his sister, “I just thought you might be interested to know—your
old Paul is not going to speak tonight. The police have arrested him.”
“Who told you that?”
“They’ve just notified the embassy. He’s to be expelled—in fact he’s on
his way now.”
“My God, Bertie, are you sure?”
“Of course I’m sure. Did you think they’d let him make Bolshevik
speeches in France?”
“I mean—are you sure they’re going to expel him?” Bunny had learned so
much about the treatment accorded to the reds—all Europe had adopted
the sweet custom of the American police, to beat their prisoners with
rubber hose, which leaves no marks upon the skin. So there began a
wrangle over the phone, Bunny in a panic, insisting upon knowing what
official had given the information to Eldon; and Bertie insisting that
Bunny should not make another of his stinks in Paris, and maybe get
himself deported, and his brother-in-law ruined in the eyes of all
Europe.
In the end Bunny hung up, and called the office of the Communist
newspaper. Did they know about the arrest of Comrade Puull Votkan—so it
was necessary to say it. No, they knew nothing about it, they would
endeavor to find out. And Bunny jumped into a taxi-cab and hastened to
the office of the Prefet de Police, where he was received with a lack of
that courtesy which police officials usually display to young gentlemen
properly tailored. They had no information to give about the American,
Puull Votkan, but they would like to receive information about an
American named Zhay Arnoll R-r-osss feess, and how long he expected to
abuse the hospitality of the French government by giving sums of money
to enemies of public safety.
Meantime Bertie, in her desperation, was appealing to Vee Tracy, begging
her to make one more effort to get Bunny out of this hideous
entanglement. Vee answered that she would make one more, and only one.
She turned from the telephone and ordered her maid to pack her
belongings, and when Bunny came back from his visit to the police, he
found a note in his mail-box:
“Dear Bunny: I have just learned why I was to be put off with a
spiritualist seance tonight, instead of going to the opera with you! The
time has come when you have to choose between your red friends and me,
and I have moved to another hotel until you make up your mind. Please
give me your decision by letter. Do not try to see me, because I will
not speak to you again until this matter has been settled. If it is to
be all over between us, a quick clean cut is the way I choose. I will no
longer endure the humiliation of being associated with dangerous
criminals; and unless you can say that you love me enough to change your
associates, I mean that you are never to see me again. Take time to
think it over, but not too much time. Yours, Vee.”
As a matter of fact, Bunny did not need any time. Even while he was
reading the letter, a voice was telling him that he had known it was
coming. After the first shock of pain had passed, he sat himself down
and wrote:
“Dear Vee: We have had great happiness together. I have suffered for a
long time, because I knew it had to end. I won’t waste your time arguing
in defense of my ideas; I have some, and cannot give them up, any more
than you can yours. I wish you every happiness that can come to you in
life, and hope you will not cherish bitterness in your heart, because it
is something I truly cannot change. If ever the time comes that I can
aid you, I will be yours to command. With just the same affection,
Bunny-rabbit.”
VIII
Bunny must not stop to nourish his grief, but must hurry to call upon
the French Communists and offer to pay the costs of a lawyer to
institute legal proceedings and find out what was happening to Paul. But
as a matter of fact the effort was not necessary, for next morning all
the newspapers had the story: a notorious American Bolshevik agitator
had been escorted by the authorities to Havre and placed on board a
steamer to sail that day. The Communist paper in its report commented
sarcastically; this was one Bolshevik agitator whom the American
government could not very well refuse to admit, since they had him under
bond of twenty thousand dollars to make his appearance in court! Bunny
had so little confidence in the French authorities that he took the
precaution to wireless Paul to the steamer with reply prepaid; and a few
hours later he got the words, “On the way to Paradise”—a code message
from Paul!
Three days later came a message from his sweetheart—no code this time,
but a proclamation to the whole world. The newspapers of Paris and all
other capitals—of Madagascar, Paraguay, Nova Zembla, Thibet and New
Guinea—announced the engagement of Viola Tracy, American screen
actress, to Prince Marescu of Roumania; the wedding was to take place in
the great cathedral of Bucharest, and Queen Marie herself would attend.
The efficient publicity organization of Schmolsky-Superba had contrived
many a stunt in its time, but never one so effective as this which fate
handed to it, free, gratis, and for nothing!
And so there was a chapter closed in Bunny’s life. The door which had
led from his suite in the hotel to Vee’s suite was locked, and a piece
of furniture moved in front of it. But there was no piece of furniture
that could be moved in front of the memory in Bunny’s mind! Nothing
could shut out that slender white figure, so vivid and eager, and the
memory of the delights she had brought to him. He was maimed in soul, as
the victims of the White Terror were maimed in body—and in the same
cause!
There were women here, of all kinds and sizes, native and American,
young ladies of the highest fashionableness, willing to receive the
attentions of a young oil prince. They knew about his romance and his
broken heart; and their shrewd mammas told them an ancient formula,
known to the feminine world since the dawn of coquetry—“Catch him on
the rebound!” Bunny was besought to attend tea-parties and dances, but
mostly he went to Socialist meetings; and when he thought about girls,
it was to Angel City that his fancy fled. Ruth Watkins was so gentle and
quiet, yet brave—not giving up her brother because he turned into a
Bolshevik! And Rachel Menzies was so steady, so grim in her
determination to send him a four-page paper, as regular as the calendar,
and always telling him everything he wanted to know! Once every month
she sent an itemized statement of receipts and expenditures, typed with
her own fingers, and always exactly right—whatever dollars were left
over went for sample copies, so he was never troubled by either surplus
or deficit!
IX
September, and Dad came bringing an announcement that caused him to
hesitate, and turn fiery red after he got going. “You know, son, I have
got to be very good friends with Alyse, we—that is, we are interested
in the same ideas, and we realize that we can help each other.”
“Yes, Dad, of course.”
“Well, the fact is—you know how it is—I’ve been imposing on you for so
long, but now you will be free, because I’ve asked Alyse to marry me,
and she consents.”
“Well, Dad, I’ve been expecting that for quite a while. I’m sure you
will be happy.”
Dad looked very much relieved—had he feared a tantrum, after the
fashion of Bertie? He hastened to say, “I want to tell you—Alyse and I
have talked the matter over, and we agree—she is fond of you, and
appreciates your standing by me and all, and she wants you to know that
she’s not marrying me for my money.”
“No, Dad, I don’t think that.”
“Well, you know Bertie, and what she thinks. Bertie is mercenary—I
suppose she got it from her mother. Anyhow, I’m not a-goin’ to say
anything to her about this, it is none of her business; we’ll jist get
married on the quiet, and Bertie can read about it in the papers. What
I’m a-goin’ to do is this—Alyse says she hasn’t had anything to do with
helping me make my money, and she don’t want my children to hate her, as
they will if she comes in and takes a big share.”
“Oh, but I won’t, Dad!”
“We’ve agreed that I’m to make a will, and leave a million dollars to
her, and the rest will go to you and Bertie, and Alyse will be satisfied
with that—it will give her enough to carry on the psychic work she’s
interested in. You understand, she wants to do that—”
“Yes, of course, Dad. I am a propagandist too!”
“I know son; and what I’ve been thinking—you have a right to express
your ideas. And while I don’t agree with that little paper, I can see
that it’s honest, it says what you think; so I’m a-goin’ to make over a
million dollars worth of Ross stock to you, and you can jist go ahead
and do what you please with that. I hope you won’t turn into a
Bolsheviki like Paul, and I hope you won’t find it necessary to get into
jail.”
“It would be pretty hard to keep me in jail if I had a million dollars,
Dad.”
The old man grinned; the mediums and the spirits had not yet driven the
old devil entirely out of him. He went on to say that of course they
weren’t going to have as much money as he had once thought. Those
government suits were a-goin’ to dig a big hole in it—no doubt the
politicians would fix it so Dad and Verne would lose. Of course they
might get a pile out of these new deals abroad, but that was
speculative—not the sort of thing Dad fancied, but he was leaving it to
Verne.
“What are you and Mrs.—Alyse going to do, Dad?”
“Well, we want to have a sort of—you might call it a Spiritualist
honeymoon. We’ll go see that medium in Vienna, and there’s another in
Frankfort that we’ve heard about. It’ll depend for one thing on what you
want. Maybe you’ll go back to California.”
“I think I will, Dad, for a while—if you are sure you can spare me.”
Yes, Dad said he and Alyse would get along all right; his secretary had
learned enough French for practical purposes, and they would have a
courier or interpreter for their stay in Germany. He hoped the climate
there would agree with him; he didn’t seem ever to be strong now. That
flu had sort of done him up.
The preliminary steps were taken, and Bunny and his father and the
secretary and Mrs. Alyse Huntington Forsythe Olivier all put on their
best glad rags and appeared before the maire of one of the small towns
on the outskirts of Paris and were duly wedded, and Bunny kissed his new
stepmother on both cheeks, and the maire did the same, and also kissed
Bunny and Dad on both cheeks. And then Dad took his son to one side and
placed an envelope in his hands. It was an order on Verne to turn over
thirty-two hundred shares of Ross Consolidated Class B stock; a little
more than a million at the market. They were “street certificates,” Dad
explained—he had already signed them and left them with Verne, in case
they wished to market them. “And now, son,” said the old man, “have a
little sense—this is a pile of money, and don’t throw it away. Take
your time, and be sure what you want to do, and don’t let yourself be
plucked by grafters that will come round jist as soon as they smell it!”
The same old Dad! They gave each other hugs and squeezes; there were
tears in everybody’s eyes, even the secretary, and the maire and his
clerks, who had never heard of such fees for a wedding—marvelous
people, ces Americains! And Bunny said for Dad to write all the news,
and Dad said for Bunny to write all the news; and Bunny said he would
return to France next summer if Dad were not able to come to America,
and Dad said he was sure Verne would have it all fixed up before that.
And then Bunny kissed his stepmother again, and then he hugged Dad
again, and then shook hands with the secretary—a regular debauch of the
sweet sorrows of parting, with the officials and a crowd of street
urchins standing by on the sidewalk, staring at the grand rich car and
the grand rich Americans. Bunny was glad to look back on it in after
years—at least that once the old man had been happy! All the chatter,
and the messages, and the flowers, the baggage to be seen to and the
robes to be tucked in—and then at last they were rolling down the
street, amid waving of hands and cheers—headed for a Spiritualist
seance in Frankfort-am-Main!
Bunny took a train back to Paris, and wrote out two messages announcing
that he was sailing for home; one to Ruth Watkins and one to Rachel
Menzies—playing no favorites! Then he bought a paper, and read a brief
despatch—“Great California Oil Fire.” A bolt of lightning had struck
one of the storage tanks of the Ross Consolidated Oil Company at
Paradise, California, and as a high wind was blowing, it was not thought
possible to save any portion of the tank-farm, and possibly the whole
field might be destroyed.
When Bunny got back to the hotel, there was a cablegram from Angel City.
It was impossible to make any guess what the damage would be, but they
were fully insured and nothing to worry about, “A. H. Dory”—still
Verne’s signature when he wanted to be playful. Bunny forwarded the
message to his father, and asked if he should wait; but Dad’s answer
was, no, whatever he had to say could be said by letter or cable, and he
would be glad to have Bunny on the scene to report. “Love and best
wishes,” were the concluding words—the last that Dad was ever to say to
his son, except through the channel of the spirits!
X
A steamer took Bunny out to sea—one of those floating hotels, like the
one he had left in Paris, fitted in the style of a palace, mahogany
finish and silken draperies and cushions, and the most elegant society,
flashing jewels and costly gowns—five thousand dollars per female
person would have been a modest estimate for evenings in the dining
saloon. And very soon the tongues of gossip began to buzz—“His father’s
the California oil man, they say he owns whole fields out there, but one
of them is burning up, according to the papers. The Ross that was in the
scandal, you remember, he’s hiding abroad, been there nearly a year, but
the son can come back, of course. They say he was one of the lovers of
Viola Tracy, but she chucked him and married the Roumanian prince. Catch
him on the rebound, my dear!”
So everybody was lovely to Bunny; so many charming young things to dance
with, until any hour of the morning; or to stroll on deck and be lost in
the darkness with, if one preferred. All day they flitted about him,
casting coy and seductive glances: they were interested in everything he
was interested in, even the book he was reading—provided he would talk
about it instead of reading it. There were some who would say that they
were interested in Socialism, they didn’t know much about it, but were
eager to learn. Until the second morning out, when the young Socialist
received a wireless which entirely removed him from fashionable society:
“Your father very ill with double pneumonia have obtained best medical
attention will keep you informed deepest sympathy and affection Alyse.”
So then Bunny walked the deck alone, and suffered exactly those torments
of remorse which Vernon Roscoe had predicted for him. Oh, surely he
could have been kinder, more patient with that good old man! Surely he
could have tried harder to understand and to help! Now fate was taking
him away, five or six hundred miles every day—and at any moment might
snatch him to a distance beyond calculation. His father himself had felt
it—Bunny went over what he had said, and realized that Dad had faced
the thought of death, and had been giving his son such last advice as he
could.
At first nothing but remorse. But then little by little the debate—the
old, old dispute that had torn Bunny’s mind in half. Was it possible for
men to go on doing what Dad had been doing in the conduct of his
business? Could any civilization endure on the basis of such purchase of
government? No, Bunny told himself; but then—he should have tried
harder, more lovingly, and persuaded his father to stop it! But at what
stage? Dad had been purchasing government ever since Bunny could
remember, as a little boy. All the oil men purchased government, all big
business men did it, either before or after election. And at what stage
of life shall a boy say to his father, your way of life is wrong, and
you must let me take charge of it?
There was no new thought that Bunny could think about all this; any more
than in the case of Vee Tracy. Just the grief, and the ache of
loneliness! Old things going; they kept going—and where did they go? It
was a mystery that made you dizzy, at moments like this; you stood on
the brink of a precipice and looked down into a gulf! The most
incredible idea, that his father, who was so real, and had been for so
long a part of his being—should suddenly disappear and cease to be! For
the first time Bunny began to wonder, could Alyse be right about the
spirits?
Another message in the evening. “Condition unchanged will keep you
advised sympathy and affection.” These last words never failed in the
messages; the next day, when Dad’s condition was the same and the crisis
expected tomorrow; and then tomorrow, when Dad was sinking; and then,
the morning after, when Alyse wired, “Your father’s spirit has passed
from this world to the next but he will never cease to be with you he
spoke of you at the last and promises that if you will communicate with
a good medium in Angel City he will guide your life with love and
affection as ever Alyse.” And then a message from Bertie: “I was with
Dad at the end and he forgave me will you forgive me also.” When Bunny
read that, he had to hurry to his stateroom, and lie there and cry like
a little child. Yes, he would forgive her, so he wired in reply, and
might whoever had made them forgive them all!