JUDITH BUYS A TYPEWRITER
As the winter advanced, Judith found herself never free from her
struggle, the interest of which grew not only greater, but at times
intense. For gossip, as she foresaw, was busy with her name; and though
as yet she had not braved her circle in the endeavour to bring Ellis in,
her friends took occasion to disapprove of her acquaintance with him.
The disapproval being conveyed to her in a dozen ways, Judith was
frequently in a blaze of anger at people's officiousness, or as often
contemptuous of their curiosity. Since interference was always enough to
make her obstinate, her friends had no other effect on her than to make
her welcome Ellis more kindly than ever.
An unforeseen factor in her troubles was the state of public affairs.
Judith read the papers diligently; she perceived a general increase of
opposition to Ellis. This did not disturb her, since your true student
is aware that the public is as often wrong as right. And at first she
took no interest in the search for a leader which was conducted by that
usually impotent party, the Reformers. These gentlemen had so often, in
Judith's hearing, been gently ridiculed as milk-and-water politicians,
that even amusement ceased within her as she read anew of their efforts.
Any campaign which they should conduct would be the usual formal and
ineffectual protest against "practical politics"; their candidate would
be, as always, an obscure person with no claim on public regard.
Judith's interest woke very suddenly when it was whispered that the
reform candidate was to be George Mather.
Now she should see Mather and Ellis directly measured, and could know
the strength of each. And yet all this was still far away, while another
matter was of nearer interest: the rumour of a street-railway strike.
Wages had been lowered and the men were discontented; so also were the
patrons of the road. The efficiency of the service had greatly fallen
off, and the reform newspaper boldly dated the change at Mather's loss
of the presidency, charging Ellis with the desire to make money at the
public's expense. Judith sniffed at an accusation which she believed
would refute itself; she wondered that men should still trust in
campaign calumnies. One statement alone caused her serious thought,
namely the claim, soberly made, that in managing the details of a great
enterprise rather than attending to its finance Ellis was beyond his
depth. But at the call to the public to insist upon proper treatment as
well as to avert the calamity of a great strike Judith smiled to
herself. The public never interested itself in anything; and besides,
this was none of the public's business.
Yet, though Judith was right in thinking that the management of the
street-railway company concerned the stockholders alone, and though her
estimate of the general harmlessness of the reform party was quite
correct, her interest in Mather was renewed. Judith was always very well
aware of her states of mind, and had noted by this time that whenever
her interest in Ellis's brilliancy relaxed, she was certain to find
Mather doggedly adding to his own achievements. And she granted it to be
much in his favour that though he lacked the fascinating abilities of
his keener rival, he had a formidable solidity. The very fact that his
name was used in connection with the reform nomination, gave that
nomination seriousness.
Still, the caucus was months ahead, and it was hard to believe that
Ellis, who had never yet failed, could botch the management of the
street-railway. Men should be easier to manage than securities. And
though she received Mather kindly whenever he came, it was impossible
not to feel more interest in the man who came oftener, stayed longer,
and spoke most of himself. Mather had spoken of himself but once; he did
not seek, as Ellis did, to be alone with her, and no longer showed the
repressed eagerness of a suitor. He was easy, deliberate, never
preoccupied, and took no pains whatever to forward himself with her.
On that evening when Beth had dragged unwilling Jim into the front
parlour, to her consequent unhappiness, Mather showed no impatience at
the interruption; he even rose again gladly when, Jim having gone, poor
Beth came creeping back again.
"George," said Beth timidly, "Jim was a little--rude, just now."
"No, no," he answered heartily. "Don't think of it, Beth."
"If you will bear with him," she pursued, "I think he will come to see
how much he owes you."
"Of course he will," he agreed. "Not that I'm anxious for any
acknowledgment. I understand he's lonely, Beth."
"He is," she stated eagerly. "He misses----"
She blushed, and added hurriedly, "And much of what he says is just
manner."
"Don't you suppose I know him?" he asked. "Now don't worry, Beth. Just
keep him to his work, and he'll come out all right."
He took her hand; she looked up shyly. "Do you think me foolish,
George?"
"Fond used to mean foolish," he answered. "We'll call you fond. Jim must
succeed with you to back him!" And he kissed her hand.
"Thank you," said Beth, doubtless referring to the encouragement. "Thank
you so much, George! Good-night."
"Poor little thing!" said Mather, as he seated himself after she had
gone. "She's not happy, Judith."
"It's Jim," she answered.
"Have you any influence over him?" he asked. "If you have, make him
work."
"I noticed," she remarked, "that you did not tell Beth that she has no
cause for worry. Is he not satisfactory?"
"It may be inexperience," he answered, "it may be just Jim; I haven't
decided yet. The work isn't hard, for the foreman looks after everything
mechanical, yet our product is much less than it should be. All I need
to do is to go and sit in the Chebasset office for an hour, without
opening the door into the mill, and if the men know I'm there we turn
out six hundred pounds more that day."
The statement was not surprising, as Judith compared Jim with the man
before her. "You think he will not suit."
"I don't say that yet," he replied. "But it's very unpleasant, doing
business with your friends."
Again she sat watching him as he stared into the fire, but not with the
emotion of that former time, for the state of mind which Beth had
aroused was passing. She thought of Mather, with unimpassioned interest,
as a fine type of man; but it was undeniable that, emotion being absent,
Ellis took an increasingly greater share of her thoughts, and stirred
her imagination more. The world was growing larger before her, not the
world of society but of the _World's Work_, the _Harper's Weekly_,
almost of the _Scientific American_, those magazines which express the
spirit of modern enterprise and hardheadedness, and from which she drew
her current information. One of them had recently published Ellis's
portrait; Judith glanced from Mather to the table whereon the magazine
was at this moment lying, and compared the two men as, but a few moments
before, she had contrasted Jim and Mather. Now it was Mather who stood
at the little end of the sign of inequality; Ellis was the giant and
Mather the mere man. Rumour set them against each other, but though
Judith had heard the whisper, "Mather is back," she had also seen the
smiles as people added: "Now what will he do?"
"Yes," said Mather, rousing; "between us we can help Jim along." Then he
rose, and though it was early, said good-night. He left her wondering at
his method of cheerful entrance and speedy exit, his manner of being at
home in her presence. But after more thinking, she laid this to the fact
that he had nothing on his mind.
Yet he was conscious of a future which beckoned him, and of ambitions,
not of his own creating, which stood ready for him to assume. He knew
that it was said that Mather had returned, knew that the idle were
smiling, the serious were watching to see what he would do. Not only
Pease, Fenno, Watson, Branderson, those four powers, held an expectant
attitude toward him, but the reform politicians did the same. He knew
the public feeling toward abuses might easily be roused, vexed and
alarmed as people were with the street railroad. A determined man, in
whom the city had confidence, could easily draw many votes to himself.
But "wait," he said to himself, "it's not yet time." He had been
approached only by Pease, who inquired: "Have you any street-railway
stock?" but when Mather replied he had, Pease merely begged him not to
sell, and said no more. Yet there had been that in Pease's manner which
meant much.
Mather and Judith were far apart in these days; he sighed as he thought
of the distance between them, and turned more willingly to the
distractions which politics and business offered. He would have been
glad to have his opportunities closer at hand, that he might throw
himself into the work. Judith, on the other hand, shrank when first her
future came suddenly near.
Her father came home late one afternoon; going to greet him, she had
found him in the library, unwrapping a parcel. The Colonel, obeying his
impulse toward extravagance, had picked up down town a--wait till she
saw it!
"It's very much tied up," said Judith.
"It's rather a valuable thing," answered her father, struggling with the
string. "If only I had it out here, I'd cut this twine."
"Is it a pair of scissors?" she asked. "Slip the string over the end,
sir."
The Colonel displayed it at last, a Japanese dagger. Its hilt and sheath
were massive ivory, yellow with age, carved deeply with grotesques of
men in combat. A grinning mask formed the pommel, a writhing dragon the
guard; the warriors were grappling, hand to hand. The Colonel offered
the knife to Judith. "Look at it," he said with pride.
Something made Judith draw back. "I--it's been used."
The Colonel was irritated. "Upon my word, Judith, I should think you
were Beth. Of course it's been used; you can see that on the blade.
Look!"
He drew it from the sheath. The blade was of the usual stout Japanese
model, with a quick edge which much whetting had made very fine. An
injury had marred the symmetry of the weapon: it was evident that an
eighth of an inch had been broken from the point, which, ground again as
sharp as ever, had lost in beauty but gained in suggestiveness. The
Colonel touched the point.
"On armour or on bone, do you suppose?" he asked.
Judith had recovered herself. "You're rather grewsome, sir."
"Hang it," he complained, sheathing the knife again. "I thought you'd
like it. But Jim will, anyway." He laid the knife on the table.
"You're not going to keep it there?" she asked.
"Indeed I am," he answered. "Don't look at it if you don't want to." He
started to go, then paused. "Judith, I have asked Mr. Ellis to dinner."
She was surprised by the statement, so suddenly made and of such deep
meaning. All she could do was to repeat his words. "You have asked Mr.
Ellis to dinner?"
"Gad!" exclaimed the poor Colonel. "Is anything wrong with you this
afternoon? You are hard to please."
"Oh, if you asked him to please me----" she was beginning.
"Well," he explained, "what else could I do when he more than half
suggested it? I couldn't be rude to him. I--he--we are pretty good
friends."
But he only puzzled her the more. "You are pretty good friends?" asked
Judith, again repeating his words.
This conduct on her part made the Colonel spring to the door, where for
an instant he stood and beat his temples. "A woman's a devil!" he
exclaimed after that interval, and stamped upstairs.
When a man's behaviour takes this turn, or his philosophy leads him to
this conclusion, it is safe for the woman to assume that he has
something on his conscience. Judith stood startled.
On what terms was Ellis with her father that he could force an
invitation to dinner? And his object?
She watched Ellis during that first meal at her table. Judith had never
before seen him in evening dress, nor as yet considered him so
personally. His manners were good, his behaviour quiet; no one could
have said that he was not a fair representation of a gentleman. That he
was more he did not claim.
"This is the first time," he said, as he went in with her to the
dining-room, "that I have dined in these togs in any house besides my
own, public dinners excepted, of course. It feels stranger than I
expected."
"Why should it feel strange?" she asked.
"Because I was not born or bred to it, I suppose."
"Certainly," she remarked, "you show nothing of what you feel."
"When I was a boy," he answered, "when I lost by being too eager on my
first trade, I learned never again to show what I felt--unless it's my
purpose to. To be quiet and steady, looking and not speaking--you can't
imagine what that has done for me."
This frankness of his, which she felt was vouchsafed to her alone, was
one secret of his success with Judith. She was interested to hear him
acknowledge himself a learner; she sympathised with his effort to make
himself fit to sit at any table; and she was impressed by his study of
manners as earlier he had studied men and markets. She recognised the
full power of his determination and his self-control. But also she felt
that unmistakably she knew his object. And her father, in manner almost
deferential to Ellis, consciously or not was his ally.
Ellis made no approach to the subject which was most on his mind, though
through the evening he sat alone with her in the parlour. He spoke, as
he always did, of his affairs. Moreover, he went away early. But Judith,
when he had gone, gazed at the door which had closed behind him. He was
aiming at her! All that determination, all that formidable self-control,
were trained upon one object: herself. Then she must look forward, and
decide.
Did she wish to marry Ellis? She found no reply as she tried to read
herself; instead, her mind was confused by a lesser question: why should
her father be so friendly to him?
It would not be fair to Judith to say that she enjoyed the sensation
created by her intimacy with Ellis; nevertheless she found piquancy in
the little thrills of horror which she caused in her circle. For she
knew herself to be honestly interested by Ellis's Napoleonic force, and
could retaliate upon her clique by amusement at its littleness. She
looked at Ellis with clear eyes, perceiving little flaws which his great
powers could condone. Yet at the same time she understood her friends'
sincerity in their reprobation of him, and forgave them because they
knew no better.
She was perfectly aware that her father had no greater caliber than that
general to his class; without the slightest filial disrespect, she knew
that the Colonel was not capable of her interest in Ellis as a type and
as a force. She would not have resented opposition from her father half
so much as she had been puzzled at his acquiescence in Ellis's visits;
nor would she have been surprised by a sudden paternal outburst so much
as by to-night's encouragement. And understanding him so well, she
began to suspect that his motives were different from her own, were
lower, and that his interest might be personal. Such a suspicion of her
father was quite enough to make her suspect herself.
Three impulses rose within her, and battled together. The first was the
old ambition, drawing her to Ellis; the second was refinement, thrusting
her away from him. The third was maidenhood, which in Beth was modest
but in Judith militant, impelling her to the decision to marry nobody at
all. And just now this was strongest.
Nevertheless, Judith recognised the need of a weapon or at least a
shield against the assaults which were bound to come. She was not so
sure of herself that she dared depend on her own powers alone. Therefore
she needed a barrier behind which to retire at need, and she saw but
one. Friends could not shield her: she had too few; and pride stood
between herself and Mather. Her father would evidently be no protection.
Even with Beth her understanding was too slight to be put to use.
Employment alone would help her, and of all employments only one
attracted her. Yet for that she could be preparing herself.
With bent head she went into the sitting-room where were her father and
Beth; they put down their books as she entered, and from the table the
Colonel took up the Japanese knife.
"Beth doesn't like this much more than you do," he said.
"It's sinister," explained Beth. "All its beauty conceals a threat; its
only purpose is to bring death."
"In the past, in the past!" protested her father. "It's only an ornament
now."
"Perfectly horrid!" This from Beth, but Judith said: "It must have cost
a good deal."
"Oh, well----" the Colonel responded, waving away the subject.
"Father," said Judith abruptly, "I want a hundred dollars."
"A hundred dollars!" he cried. "Where is a hundred dollars to come from
in a jiffy?"
"Beth and I dislike the knife so," she suggested. "You might get the
dealer to take it back."
Experienced women know how unwilling men are to return boughten
articles. "I didn't get it on trial, like a wash-wringer," retorted the
Colonel. "What do you want your hundred dollars for?"
"A typewriter."
"A typewriter!" he exclaimed, and Beth echoed the word.
Judith made no explanation. "Why, that's quite out of the usual line of
expenditure," objected the Colonel. "It's an extravagance."
"A Japanese dagger might be called an extravagance," Judith returned.
"Then," answered her father, "so might those furs you bought the other
day. I told you your old set was good enough."
"If I return the furs," she asked, "will you return the dagger?"
"No, by Jove!" he cried. "It's for me to decide what I will do with my
own. I'm the provider."
"And you provide very well," she returned sweetly.
He looked at her with suspicion which sprang from remembrance of his
methods as provider, but since she seemed to have no hidden meaning he
returned to his reading. Judith, still sweetly, bade them good-night.
But the next day she started from the house dressed in all the glory of
her latest possessions. "Judith," asked Beth, "you aren't going to wear
those furs in the morning?"
"Say good-by to them," answered her sister.
"Judith!" gasped Beth. But Judith only smiled serenely and left the
house. By the assurance in bargaining which always carries its point,
and which is distinctly feminine, she got for her furs exactly what she
gave for them. That afternoon a typewriter was delivered at the house.
It was Mather who had helped her to buy it, Mather who, happening into
the store while she was there, had told her that the increase of his
business was forcing him to employ more stenographers. So he, even by
the most material of standards, was coming on. In order to forget him,
she was forced to think of Ellis, and to repeat such aphorisms as Anyone
can be a Gentleman, It takes Genius to be a Man. But after she had
thought of Ellis for a little while, again came the revulsion.
Judith, when in her chamber she first removed the cover of her
typewriter, stood for a long while gazing at its black enamel and its
nickeled keys. The machine became a symbol, a warning of fate, and
though in the coming days she practised its use almost eagerly, the
typewriter never lost its significance. It was but a feeble defense
against the victor of the two rivals.
Victor? The word was bitter. It came always with the force of a blow,
staggering her amazonian spirit: must she yield in the end? Bitter,
indeed, that while she rebelled against her womanhood she was forced to
recognise and dread it. Temporise or struggle as she might, she felt
that there lay before her an inevitable choice.