Horace Chase, following the suggestion of Mrs. Franklin (a suggestion
which had come in reality from Ruth), travelled northward to Raleigh
from Palatka without crossing to St. Augustine. He went "straight
through," as he called it; when he was alone he always went straight
through. He was no more particular as to where he slept than he was as
to what he ate. Reaching Raleigh in the evening, he went in search of
his brother-in-law. He had not sent word that he was coming. "I won't
give him time to trot out all his objections beforehand," he had said to
himself. He intended to make an attempt to arrange the matter with Jared
without calling in the aid of Genevieve. "If I fail, there'll always be
time to bring her on the scene. If I succeed, it'll take her down a bit;
and that won't hurt her!" he thought, with an inward smile.
Ruth's "horrid Raleigh" looked very pretty as he walked through its
lighted streets. The boarding-house where Jared had passed the winter
proved to be an old mansion, which, in its day, had possessed claims to
dignity; it was large, with two wings running backward, and the main
building had a high pointed roof with dormer-windows. The front was
even with the street; but the street itself was rural, with its two long
lines of magnificent trees, which formed the divisions (otherwise rather
vague) between the sidewalks and the broad expanse of the sandy roadway.
Chase's knock was answered by a little negro boy, whose head did not
reach the door-knob. "Mas' Franklin? Yassah. He's done gone out. Be in
soon, I reckon," he added, hopefully.
Chase, after a moment's reflection, decided to go in and wait.
"Show you in de parlo,' or right up in his own room, boss?" demanded the
infant, anxiously. "Dere's a party in de parlo'." This statement was
confirmed by the sound of music from within.
"A party, is there? I guess I'll go up, then," said Chase.
The child started up the stairs. His legs were so short that he had to
mount to each step with both feet, one after the other, before he could
climb to the next. These legs and feet and his arms were bare; the rest
of his small, plump person was clad in a little jacket and very short
breeches of pink calico. There were two long flights of stairs, and a
shorter flight to the attic; the pink breeches had the air of climbing
an Alp. Presently Chase took up the little toiler, candle and all.
"You can tell me which way to go," he said. "What's your name?"
"Pliny Abraham, sah."
"Do you like Mr. Franklin?"
"Mas' Franklin is de bes' body in dishyer house!" declared Pliny
Abraham, shrilly.
"The best what?"
"De bes' body. We'se got twenty-five bodies now, boss. Sometimes dere's
twenty-eight."
"Oh, you mean boarders?"
"Yassah. Bodies."
Jared's room was in the attic. Pliny Abraham, who had been intensely
serious, began to grin as his bearer, after putting him down, placed a
dime in each of his little pink pockets; then he dashed out of the room,
his black legs disappearing so suddenly that Chase had the curiosity to
follow to the top of the stairs and look over. Pliny had evidently slid
down the banisters; for he was already embarked on the broader rail of
the flight below.
Twenty minutes later there was a step on the stair; the door opened, and
Jared Franklin came in.
"They didn't tell you I was here?" said Chase, as they shook hands.
"No. Mrs. Nightingale is usually very attentive; too much so, in fact;
she's a bother!" Jared answered. "To-night, however, there's a party
down below, and she has the supper on her mind."
"Is Pliny Abraham to serve it?"
"You've seen him, have you?" said Jared, who was now lighting a lamp.
"Confounded smell--petroleum!" And he threw up the sash of the window.
"I'm on my way up to New York, and I came across from Goldsborough on
purpose to see you, Franklin, on a matter of business," Chase began.
"Ruth isn't with me this time; she took a notion to go north by sea.
Your mother and sister, I expect, will be seeing her off to-morrow from
Charleston; then, after a little rest for Miss Dolly, they're to go to
L'Hommedieu."
"They'll stop here, won't they?" asked Jared, who was standing at the
window in order to get air which was untainted by the odor of the lamp.
"Perhaps," Chase answered. He knew that Dolly and her mother believed
that by the time they should reach Raleigh, Jared would have already
left. "Well, the gist of the matter, Franklin, is about this," he went
on. And then, tilting his chair back so that his long legs should have
more room, and with his thumbs in the pockets of his waistcoat, he began
deliberately to lie.
For in the short space of time which had elapsed since his eyes first
rested upon Ruth's brother, he had entirely altered his plan. His
well-arranged arguments and explanations about the place in New York in
connection with his California scheme--all these he had abandoned;
something must be invented which would require no argument at all,
something which should attract Jared so strongly that he would of his
own accord accept it on the spot, and start northward the next morning.
"Once in New York, in our big house there, with Gen (for I shall
telegraph her to come on) and Ruth and the best doctors, perhaps the
poor chap can be persuaded to give up, and take a good long rest," he
thought.
For he had been greatly shocked by the change in Jared's appearance.
When he had last seen him, the naval officer had been gaunt; but now he
was wasted. His eyes had always been sad; but now they were deeply
sunken, with dark hollows under them and over them. "He looks _bad_,"
Chase said to himself, emphatically. "This sort of life's been too much
for him, and Gen's got a good deal to answer for!" The only ornament of
the whitewashed wall was a large photograph of the wife; her handsome
face, with its regular outlines and calm eyes, presided serenely over
the attic room of the lonely husband.
To have to contrive something new, plausible, and effective, in two
minutes' time, might have baffled most men. But Horace Chase had never
had a mind of routine, he had always been a free lance; original
conceptions and the boldest daring, accompanied by an extraordinary
personal sagacity, had formed his especial sort of genius--a genius
which had already made him, at thirty-nine, a millionaire many times
over. His invention, therefore, when he unrolled it, had an air of
perfect veracity. It had to do with a steamer, which (so he represented)
a man whom he knew had bought, in connection with what might be called,
perhaps, a branch of his own California scheme, although a branch with
which he himself had nothing whatever to do. This man needed an
experienced officer to take the steamer immediately from San Francisco
to the Sandwich Islands, and thence on a cruise to various other islands
in the South Pacific. "The payment, to a navy man like you, ought to be
pretty good. But I can't say what the exact figure will be," he went on,
warily, "because I'm not in it myself, you see. He's a good deal of a
skinflint" (here he coolly borrowed a name for the occasion, the name of
a capitalist well known in New York); "but he's sound. It's a _bona
fide_ operation; I can at least vouch for that. The steamer is
first-class, and you can pick out your own crew. There'll be a man
aboard to see to the trading part of it; all _you've_ got to do is to
sail the ship." And in his driest and most practical voice he went on
enumerating the details.
Jared knew that his brother-in-law had more than once been engaged in
outside speculations on a large scale; his acquaintance, therefore, with
kindred spirits, men who bought ocean steamers and sent them on cruises,
did not surprise him. The plan attracted him; he turned it over in his
mind to see if there were any reasons why he should not accept it. There
seemed to be none. To begin with, Horace Chase had nothing to do with
it; he should not be indebted to _him_ for anything save the chance. In
addition, it would not be an easy berth, with plenty to get and little
to do, like the place at Charleston; on the contrary, a long voyage of
this sort would call out all he knew. And certainly he was sick of his
present life--deathly sick!
Chase had said to himself: "Fellows who go down so low--and he's at the
end of _his_ rope; that's plain--go up again like rockets sometimes,
just give 'em a chance."
Jared, however, showed no resemblance to a rocket. He agreed, after a
while, to "undertake the job," as Chase called it, and he agreed, also,
to start the next morning with his brother-in-law for New York, where
the final arrangements were to be made; but his assent was given
mechanically, and his voice sounded weak, as though, physically, he had
very little strength. Mentally there was more stir. "I shall be deuced
glad to be on salt-water again," he said. "I dare say _you_ think it's a
very limited life," he went on (and in the phrase there lurked something
scornful).
"Well," answered Chase, with his slight drawl, "that depends upon what a
man wants, what he sets out to do." He put his hands down in the pockets
of his trousers, and looked at the lamp reflectively; then he
transferred his gaze to Jared. "I guess you've got a notion, Franklin,
that I care for nothing but money? And that's where you make a mistake.
For 'tain't the money; it's the making it. Making it (that is, in large
sums) is the best sort of a game. If you win, there's nothing like it.
It's sport, _that_ is! It's fun! To get down to the bed-rock of the
subject, it's the power. Yes, sir, that's it--the power! The knowing
you've got it, and that other men know it too, and feel your hand on the
reins! For a big pile is something more than a pile; it's a proof that
a man's got brains. (I mean, of course, if he has made it himself; I'm
not talking now about fortunes that are inherited, or are simply rolled
up by a rise in real estate.) As to the money taken alone, of course
it's a good thing to have, and I'm going on making more as long as I
can; I like it, and I know how. But about the disposing of it" (here he
took his hands out of his pockets and folded his arms), "I don't mind
telling you that I've got other ideas. My family--if I have a
family--will be provided for. After that, I've a notion that I may set
aside a certain sum for scientific research (I understand that's the
term). I don't know much about science myself; but I've always felt a
sort of general interest in it, somehow."
"Oh, you intend to be a benefactor, do you?" said Jared, ironically. "I
hope, at least, that your endowment won't be open to everybody. It's
only fair to tell you that, in _my_ opinion, one of the worst evils of
our country to-day is this universal education--education of all classes
indiscriminately."
Chase looked at him for a moment in silence. Then, with a quiet dignity
which was new to the other man, he answered, "I don't think I understand
you."
"Oh yes, you do," responded Jared, with a little laugh. But he felt
somewhat ashamed of his speech, and he bore it off by saying, "Are you
going to found a new institution? Or leave it in a lump to Harvard?"
"I haven't got as far as that yet. I thought perhaps Ruth might like to
choose," Chase answered, his voice softening a little as he pronounced
his wife's name.
"Ruth? Much _she_ knows about it!" said the brother, amused. In his
heart he was thinking, "Well, at any rate, he isn't one of the blowers,
and that's a consolation! He is going to 'plank down' handsomely for
'scientific research.' (I wonder if he thinks they'll research another
baking-powder!) But he isn't going to shout about it. The fact is that
this is the first time I have ever heard him speak of himself, and his
own ideas. What he said just now about making money, that's his credo,
evidently. Pretty dry one! But, for such a fellow as he is, natural
enough, I suppose."
Chase's credo, if such it was, was ended; he showed no disposition to
speak further of himself; on the contrary, he turned the conversation
towards his companion. For as the minutes had passed, more and more
Jared seemed to him ill--profoundly changed. "I'm afraid, Franklin, that
your health isn't altogether first-class nowadays?" he said,
tentatively.
"Oh, I'm well enough, except that just now there's some sort of an
intermittent fever hanging about me. But it's very slight, and it only
appears occasionally; I dare say it will leave me as soon as I'm fairly
out of this hole of a place," Jared answered, in a dull tone.
"He must be mighty glad to get away, and yet he doesn't rally worth a
cent," thought Chase, with inward concern. "I say," he went on, aloud,
"as there's a party in the house, why not come along down to the hotel
and sleep there? I'm going to have some sort of a lunch when I go back;
you might keep me company?"
Jared, however, made a gesture of repugnance. "I couldn't eat; I've no
appetite. The party doesn't trouble me--I'll go to bed. There'll be
plenty to do in the morning, if we are to catch that nine o'clock
train."
Chase therefore took leave, and Jared accompanied him down to the street
door. Dancing was going on in the parlors on each side of the hall, and
the two, as they passed, caught a glimpse of pretty girls in white, with
flowers in their hair. After making an early appointment for the next
day, Chase said good-night, and turned down the tree-shaded street
towards his hotel.
His step was never a hurried one; he had not, therefore, gone far when a
person, who had left the house two minutes after his own departure,
succeeded in overtaking him. "If you please--will you stop a moment?"
said this person. She was panting, for she had been running.
Chase turned; by the light from a street-lamp, which reached them
flickeringly through the foliage, he saw a woman. Her face was in the
shadow, but a large flower, poised stiffly on the top of her head,
caught the light and gleamed whitely.
"I am Mrs. Nightingale," she began. "Mr. Franklin, the gentleman you
called awn this evenin', is a member of my family. And I've been right
anxious about Mr. Franklin; I'm thankful somebody has come who knows
him. For indeed, sir, he's more sick than he likes to acknowledge. I've
been watchin' for you to come down; but when I saw _he_ was with you, I
had to wait until he'd gone up again; then I slipped out and ran after
you."
"I've been noticing that he looked bad, ma'am," Chase answered.
"Oh, sir, somebody ought to be with him; he has fever at night, and when
it comes awn, he's out of his head. I've sat up myself three nights
lately to keep watch. He locks his do'; but there's an empty room next
to his where I stay, so that if he comes out I can see that he gets no
harm."
"He walks about, then?"
"In his own room--yes, sir; an' he talks, an' raves."
"Couldn't you have managed to have him see a doctor, ma'am?"
"I've done my best, but he won't hear of it. You see, it only comes awn
every third night or so, an' he has no idea himself how bad it is. In
the mawnin' it's gone, an' then all he says is that the breakfast is
bad. He goes to his business every day regular, though he looks so
po'ly. And he doesn't eat enough to keep a fly alive."
Chase reflected. "I'll have a doctor go with us on the sly to-morrow,"
he thought, "and I'll engage a whole sleeper at Weldon to go through to
New York. I'll wire to Gen to start at once; she needn't be more than a
day behind us if she hurries." Then he went on, aloud: "Do you think he
is likely to be feverish to-night, ma'am?"
"I hope not, sir, as last night was bad."
"I guess it will be better, then, not to wake him up and force a doctor
upon him now, as he told me he was going to bed. I intend to take him
north with me to-morrow morning, ma'am, and in the meantime--that little
room you spoke of next to his--_I'll_ occupy it to-night, if you'll let
me? I'll just go down to the hotel and get my bag, and be back soon. I'm
his brother-in-law," Chase continued, shaking hands with her, "and we're
all much obliged, ma'am, for what you've done; it was mighty kind--the
keeping watch at night."
He went to his hotel, made a hasty supper, and returned, bag in hand,
before the half-hour was out. Mrs. Nightingale ushered him down one of
the long wings to her own apartment at the end, a comfortless, crowded
little chamber, full of relics of the war--her husband's sword and
uniform (he was shot at Gettysburg); his portrait; the portrait of her
brother, also among the slain; photographs of their graves; funeral
wreaths and flags.
"Excuse my bringin' you here, sir; it's the only place I have. Mr.
Franklin hasn't gone to bed yet; I slipped up a moment ago to see, and
there was a light under his do'. I'm afraid it would attract his
attention if you should go up now, sir, for he knows that the next room
is unoccupied."
"_You've_ occupied it, ma'am. But I guess you know how to step pretty
soft," Chase answered, gallantly. For now that he saw this good
Samaritan in a brighter light, he appreciated the depth of her charity.
The mistress of the boarding-house was the personification of chronic
fatigue; her dim eyes, her worn face, her stooping figure, and the
enlarged knuckles and bones of her hands, all told of hard toil and
care. Her thin hair was re-enforced behind by huge palpably false braids
of another shade, and the preposterous edifice, carried over the top of
the head, was adorned, in honor of the party, by the large white
camellia, placed exactly in the centre--"like a locomotive head-light,"
Chase thought--which had attracted his notice in the street. But in
spite of her grotesque coiffure, no one with a heart could laugh at her.
The goodness in her faded face was so genuine and beautiful that
inwardly he saluted it. "She's the kind that'll never be rested _this_
side the grave," he said to himself.
Left alone in her poor little temple of memories, he went to the window
and looked out. It was midnight, and the waning moon--the same moon
which had been full when Ruth made her happy pilgrimage at St.
Augustine--was now rising in its diminished form; diminished though it
was, it gave out light enough to show the Northerner that the old house
had at the back, across both stories, covered verandas--"galleries,"
Mrs. Nightingale called them. Above, the pointed roof of the main
building towered up dark against the star-decked sky, and from one of
its dormer-windows came a broad gleam of light. "That's Jared's room,"
thought Chase. "He is writing to Gen, telling her all about it; sick as
he is, he sat up to do it. Meanwhile _she_ was comfortably asleep at
ten."
At last, when Jared had finally gone to bed, Mrs. Nightingale (who made
no more sound than a mouse) led the way up to the attic. Chase followed
her, shoeless, treading as cautiously as he could, and established
himself in the empty room with his door open, and a lighted candle in
the hall outside. By two o'clock the party down-stairs was over; the
house sank into silence.
There had been no sound from Jared. "He's all right; I shall get him
safely off to-morrow," thought the watcher, with satisfaction. "At New
York, if he's well enough to talk, I shall have to invent another yarn
about that steamer. But probably the doctors will tell him on the spot
that he isn't able to undertake it. So that'll be the end of _that_."
His motionless position ended by cramping him; the chair was hard; each
muscle of both legs seemed to have a separate twitch. "I might as well
lie down on the bed," he thought; "there, at least, I can stretch out."
He was awakened by a sound; startled, he sat up, listening. Jared, in
the next room, was talking. The words could not be distinguished; the
tone of the voice was strange. Then the floor vibrated; Jared had risen,
and was walking about. His voice grew louder. Chase noiselessly went
into the hall, and stood listening at the door. There was no light
within, and he ventured to turn the handle. But the bolt was fast. A
white figure now stole up the stairs and joined him; it was Mrs.
Nightingale, wrapped in a shawl. "Oh, I heard him 'way from my room! He
has never been so bad as this before," she whispered.
Chase had always been aware that the naval officer disliked him; that
is, that he had greatly disliked the idea of his sister's marriage. "If
he sees me now, when he is out of his head, will it make him more
violent? Would it be better to have a stranger go in first?--the
doctor?"--these were the questions that occupied his mind while Mrs.
Nightingale was whispering her frightened remark.
From the room now came a wild cry. That decided him. "I am going to
burst in the lock," he said to his companion, hurriedly. "Call up some
one to help me hold him, if necessary." His muscular frame was strong;
setting his shoulder against the door, after two or three efforts he
broke it open.
But the light from the candle outside showed that the room was empty,
and, turning, he ran at full speed down the three flights of stairs,
passing white-robed, frightened groups (for the whole house was now
astir), and, unlocking the back door, he dashed into the court-yard
behind, his face full of dread. But there was no lifeless heap on the
ground. Then, hastily, he looked up.
Dawn was well advanced, though the sun had not yet risen; the clear,
pure light showed that nothing was lying on the roof of the upper
gallery, as he had feared would be the case. At the same instant, his
eyes caught sight of a moving object above; coming up the steep slope of
the roof from the front side, at first only the head visible, then the
shoulders, and finally the whole body, outlined against the violet sky,
appeared Jared Franklin. He was partly dressed, and he was talking to
himself; when he reached the apex of the roof he paused, brandishing his
arms with a wild gesture, and swaying unsteadily.
Several persons were now in the court-yard; men had hurried out. Two
women joined them, and looked up. But when they saw the swaying figure
above, they ran back to the shelter of the hall, veiling their eyes and
shuddering. In a few moments all the women in the house had gathered in
this lower hall, frightened and tearful.
Chase, meanwhile, outside, was pulling off his socks. "Get ladders," he
said, quickly, to the other men. "I'm going up. I'll try to hold him."
"Oh, how _can_ you get there?" asked Mrs. Nightingale, sobbing.
"The same way he did," Chase answered, as he ran up the stairs.
The men remonstrated. Two of them hurried after him. But he was ahead,
and, mounting to the sill of Jared's window, he stepped outside. Then,
not allowing himself to look at anything but the apex directly above
him, he walked slowly and evenly towards it up the steep incline, his
head and shoulders bent forward, his bare feet clinging to the
moss-grown shingles, while at intervals he touched with the tips of his
fingers the shingles that faced him, as a means of steadying himself.
Down in the court-yard no word was now spoken. But the gazers drew their
breath audibly. Jared appeared to be unaware of any one below; his eyes,
though wide open, did not see the man who was approaching. Chase
perceived this, as soon as he himself had reached the top, and he
instantly took advantage of it; he moved straight towards Jared on his
hands and knees along the line of the ridge-pole. When he had come
within reach, he let himself slip down a few inches to a chimney that
was near; then, putting his left arm round this chimney as a support, he
stretched the right upward, and with a sudden grasp seized the other
man, throwing him down and pinning him with one and the same motion.
Jared fell on his back, half across the ridge, with his head hanging
over one slope and his legs and feet over the other; it was this
position which enabled Chase to hold him down. The madman (his frenzy
came from a violent form of inflammation of the brain) struggled
desperately. His strength seemed so prodigious that to the watchers
below it appeared impossible that the rescuer could save him, or even
save himself. The steep roof had no parapet; and the cruel pavement
below was stone; the two bodies, grappled in a death-clutch, must go
down together.
"Oh, _pray_! Pray to God!" called a woman's voice from the court below.
She spoke to Chase. But at that moment nothing in him could be spared
from his own immense effort; not only all the powers of his body, but of
his heart and mind and soul as well, were concentrated upon the one
thing he had to do. He accomplished it; feeling his arm growing weak, he
made a tremendous and final attempt to jam down still harder the breast
he grasped, and the blow (for it amounted to a blow) reduced Jared to
unconsciousness; his hands fell back, his ravings ceased. His strength
had been merely the fictitious force of fever; in reality he was weak.
The ladders came. Both men were saved.
"Come, now, if the roof had been only three inches above the ground--how
then?" Chase said, impatiently, as, after the visit of a doctor and the
arrival of two nurses, he came down for a hasty breakfast in Mrs.
Nightingale's dining-room, where the boarders began to shake hands with
him, enthusiastically. "The thing itself was simple enough; all that was
necessary was to act as though it _was_ only three inches."