Wade went through the unnecessary form of "giving notice" a day or two
after his old master was laid to rest. On the day that Templeton Thorpe
went to the hospital he abandoned an almost lifelong habit of cocking his
head in an attitude of listening, and went about the house with the
corners of his mouth drooping instead of maintaining their everlasting
twist upward in the set smile of humility.
He had been there for thirty years and more, and now he was no longer
needed. He would have to get out. He had saved a little money,—not much,
but enough to start a small business of some sort,—and he was complaining
bitterly to himself of the fate that deprived him of Mr. Thorpe's advice
just when it was imperative that he should know what enterprise would be
the safest for him to undertake. It nettled him to think that he had
failed to take advantage of his opportunities while this shrewd, capable
old man was alive and in a position to set him on the right path to
prosperity. He should have had the sense to look forward to this very day.
For thirty years he had gone on believing that he knew so much more than
Mr. Thorpe that Mr. Thorpe couldn't possibly get along without him, and
now he was brought up sharply against the discovery that he couldn't get
along without Mr. Thorpe. For thirty years he had done only the things
that Mr. Thorpe wanted him to do, instructed him to do, or even drove him
to do. Suddenly he found himself with absolutely nothing to do, or at any
rate with no one to tell him what to do, and instead of a free and
independent agent, with no one to order him about, he wasn't anything,—he
wasn't anything at all. This was not what he had been looking forward to
with such complacency and confidence. He was like a lost soul. No one to
tell him what to do! No one to valet! No one to call him a blundering
idiot! No one to despise except himself! And he had waited thirty years
for the day to come when he could be his own man, with the power to tell
every one to go to the devil—and to do so himself if he saw fit. He hardly
recognised himself when he looked in the mirror. Was that scared, bleak,
wobegone face a reflection? Was he really like that?
He was filled with a bitter rage against Mr. Thorpe. How he hated him for
dying like this and leaving him with nothing to do after all these years
of faithful service. And how shocked he was, and frightened, to discover
himself wanting to pause outside his master's door with his head cocked to
hear the voice that would never shout out to him again.
He knew to a penny just how much he had in the Savings Banks about town,—a
trifle over twelve thousand dollars, the hoardings of thirty years. He had
gone on being a valet all these years without a single thought of being
anything else, and yet he had always looked forward to the day when he
could go into some nice, genteel little business for himself,—when he
could step out of service and enjoy life to the full. But how was he to go
about stepping out of service and into a nice, genteel little business
without Mr. Thorpe to tell him what to do? Here was he, sixty-five years
old, without a purpose in life. Beginning life at sixty-five!
Of course, young Mrs. Thorpe would have no use for a valet. No doubt she
would marry again,—Wade had his notions!—but he couldn't think of
subjecting himself to the incompetency of a new master, even though his
old place were held open for him. He would not be able to adjust himself
to another master,—or to put it in his own words, it would be impossible
to adjust another master to himself. Young Master Braden might give him
something to do for the sake of old times, but then again Mrs. Thorpe
would have to be taken into consideration. Wade hadn't the slightest doubt
that she would one day "marry into the family again." As a matter of fact,
he believed in his soul that there was an understanding between the young
people. There were moments when he squinted his eyes and cringed a little.
He would have given a great deal to be able to put certain thoughts out of
his mind.
And then there was another reason for not wanting to enter the service of
Dr. Braden Thorpe. Suppose he were to become critically ill. Would he, in
that event, feel at liberty to call in an outside doctor to take charge of
his case? Would it not be natural for Dr. Braden to attend him? And
suppose that Dr. Braden were to conclude that he couldn't get well!
He gave notice to Murray, the butler. He hated to do this, for he despised
Murray. The butler would not have to go. He too had been with Mr. Thorpe
for more than a quarter of a century, and death had not robbed him of a
situation. What manner of justice was it that permitted Murray to go on
being useful while he had to go out into the world and become a burden to
himself?
"Murray informs me, Wade, that you have given notice," said Anne, looking
up as he shuffled into an attitude before her. "He says that you have
saved quite a lot of money and are therefore independent. I am happy to
hear that you are in a position to spend the remainder of your life in
ease and—why, what is the matter, Wade?"
He was very pale, and swayed slightly. "If you please, madam, Murray is
mistaken," he mumbled. An idea was forming in his unhappy brain. "I—I am
leaving because I realise that you no longer have any use for my services,
and not because I am—er—well off, as the saying is. I shall try to get
another place." His mind was clear now. The idea was completely formed.
"Of course, it will be no easy matter to find a place at my age,
but,—well, a man must live, you know." He straightened up a bit, as if a
weight had been lifted from his shoulders.
She was puzzled. "But you have money, Wade. You have worked hard. You have
earned a good rest. Why should you go on slaving for other people?"
"Alas," said Wade, resuming the patient smile that had been missing for
days and cocking his head a little, "it is not for me to rest. Murray does
not know everything. My savings are small. He does not know the uses to
which I have been obliged to—I beg pardon, madam, you cannot, of course,
be interested in my poor affairs." He was very humble.
"But Mr. Thorpe always spoke of you as an exceedingly thrifty man. I am
sure that he believed you to be comfortably fixed for life, Wade."
"Quite so," agreed Wade. "And I should have been had it been possible to
lay by with all these unmentioned obligations crowding upon me, year in,
year out."
"Your family? I did not know that there was any one dependent upon you."
"I have never spoken of my affairs, ma'am," said Wade. "It is not for a
servant to trouble his employer with—ahem! You understand, I am sure."
"Perfectly. I am sorry."
"So I thought I would give notice at once, madam, so that I might be on
the lookout as soon as possible for a new place. You see, I shall soon be
too old to apply for a place, whilst if I manage to secure one in time I
may be allowed to stay on in spite of my age."
"Have you anything in view?"
"Nothing, madam. I am quite at a loss where to—"
"Take all the time you like, Wade," she said, genuinely sorry for the man.
She never had liked him. He was the one man in all the world who might
have pitied her for the mistake she had made, and he had steeled his heart
against her. She knew that he felt nothing but scorn for her, and yet she
was sorry for him. This was new proof to her that she had misjudged her
own heart. It was a softer thing than she had supposed. "Stay on here
until you find something satisfactory. Mr. Thorpe would have wished you to
stay. You were a very faithful friend to him, Wade. He set great store by
you."
"Thank you, madam. You are very kind. Of course, I shall strive to make
myself useful while I remain. I dare say Murray can find something for me
to do. Temporarily, at least, I might undertake the duties of the furnace
man and handy-man about the house. He is leaving to-morrow, I hear. If you
will be so good as to tell Murray that I am to take O'Toole's
place,—temporarily, of course,—I shall be very grateful. It will give me
time to collect my thoughts, ma'am."
"It will not be necessary, Wade, for you to take on O'Toole's work. I am
not asking you to perform hard, manual labor. You must not feel that my—"
"Pardon me, madam," interrupted he; "I very much prefer to do some sort of
regular work, if I may be permitted."
She smiled. "You will find Murray a hard task-master, I am afraid."
He took a long breath, as of relief—or could it have been pleasure? "I
quite understand that, madam. He is a martinet. Still, I shall not mind."
The same thought was in the mind of each: he was accustomed to serving a
hard task-master. "If you don't mind, I shall take O'Toole's place until
you find some one else. To-morrow I shall move my belongings from the room
upstairs to O'Toole's room off the furnace-room. Thank—"
"No!" she exclaimed. "You are not to do that. Keep your old room, Wade.
I—I cannot allow you to go down there. Mr. Thorpe would never forgive me
if he knew that—" He lifted his eyes at the sudden pause and saw that she
was very white. Was she too afraid of ghosts?
"It's very good of you," he said after a moment. "I shall do as you wish
in everything, and I shall let you know the instant I find another place."
He cleared his throat. "I fear, madam, that in the confusion of the past
few days I have failed to express to you my sympathy. I assure you the
oversight was not—"
She was looking straight into his eyes. "Thank you, Wade," she interrupted
coldly. "Your own grief would be sufficient excuse, if any were necessary.
If you will send Murray to me I will tell him that you have withdrawn your
notice and will stay on in O'Toole's place. It will not be necessary for
him to engage another furnace-man at present."
"No, ma'am," said Wade, and then added without a trace of irony in his
voice: "At any rate not until cold weather sets in."
And so it was that this man solved the greatest problem that had ever
confronted him. He went down into the cellars to take orders from the man
he hated, from the man who would snarl at him and curse him and humiliate
him to the bitter end, and all because he knew that he could not begin
life over again. He wanted to be ordered about, he wanted to be snarled at
by an overbearing task-master. It simplified everything. He would never be
called upon to think for himself. Thorpe or Murray, what mattered which of
them was in command? It was all the same to him. His dignity passed, away
with the passing of his career as a "Man," and he rejoiced in the belief
that he had successfully evaded the responsibilities that threatened him
up to the moment he entered the presence of the mistress of the house. He
was no longer without a purpose in life. He would not have to go out and
be independent.
Toward the end of the second week Templeton Thorpe's will was read by
Judge Hollenback in the presence of "the family." There had been some
delay on account of Braden Thorpe's absence from the city. No one knew
where he had gone, nor was he ever to explain his sudden departure
immediately after the funeral. He simply disappeared from his hotel,
without so much as a bag or a change of linen in his possession, so far as
one could know. At the end of ten days he returned as suddenly and as
casually as he had gone away, but very much improved in appearance. The
strange pallor had left his cheeks and his eyes had lost the heavy, tired
expression.
At first he flatly refused to go down for the reading of the will. He was
not a beneficiary under the new instrument and he could see no reason for
his attendance. Anne alone understood. The old vow not to enter the house
while she was its mistress,—that was the reason. He was now in a position
to revive that vow and to order his actions accordingly.
She drooped a little at the thought of it. From time to time she caught
herself wishing that she could devise some means of punishing him, only to
berate herself afterward for the selfishness that inspired the thought.
Still, why shouldn't he come there now? She was the same now that she was
before her marriage took place,—a year older, that was all, but no less
desirable. That was the one thing she could not understand in him. She
could understand his disgust, his scorn, his rage, but she could not see
how it was possible for him to hold out against the qualities that had
made him love her so deeply before she gave him cause to hate her.
As for the operation that had resulted in the death of her husband, Anne
had but one way of looking at it. Braden had been forced to operate
against his will, against his best judgment. He was to be pitied. His
grandfather had failed in his attempt to corrupt the souls of others in
his desire for peace, and there remained but the one cowardly alternative:
the appeal to this man who loved him. In his extremity, he had put upon
Braden the task of performing a miracle, knowing full well that its
accomplishment was impossible, that failure was as inevitable as death
itself.
The thought never entered her mind that in persuading Braden to perform
this strange act of mercy her husband may have been moved by the sole
desire to put the final touch to the barrier he had wrought between them.
The fact that Braden was responsible for his death had no sinister meaning
for her. It was the same as if he had operated upon a total stranger with
a like result and with perhaps identical motives.
She kept on saying to herself that she had given up hope of ever regaining
the love she had lost. She tried to remember just when she had ceased to
hope. Was it before or after that last conversation took place in the
library? Hope may have died, but he was alive and she was alive. Then how
could love be dead?
It was Simmy Dodge who prevailed upon Braden to be present at the reading
of the will. Simmy was the sort of man who goes about, in the goodness of
his heart, adjusting matters for other people. He constituted himself in
this instance, however, as the legal adviser of his old friend and
companion, and that gave him a certain amount of authority.
"And what's more," he said in arguing with the obdurate Braden, "we'll
probably have to smash the will, if, as you say, you have been cut off
without a nickel. You—"
"But I don't want to smash it," protested Braden.
"And why not?" demanded Simmy, in surprise. "You are his only blood
relation, aren't you? Why the deuce should he leave everything away from
you? Of course we'll make a fight for it. I've never heard of a more
outrageous piece of—"
"You don't understand, Simmy," Braden interrupted, suddenly realising that
his position would be a difficult one to explain, even to this good and
loyal friend. "We'll drop the matter for the present, at any rate."
"But why should Mr. Thorpe have done this rotten, inconceivable thing to
you, Brady?" demanded Dodge. "Good Lord, that will won't stand a minute in
a court of—"
"It will stand so far as I'm concerned," said Braden sharply, and Simmy
blinked his eyes in bewilderment.
"You wouldn't be fighting Anne, you know," he ventured after a moment,
assuming that Braden's attitude was due to reluctance in that direction.
"She is provided for outside the will, she tells me."
"Are you her attorney, Simmy?"
"Yes. That is, the firm represents her, and I'm one of the firm."
"I don't see how you can represent both of us, old chap."
"That's just what I'm trying to get into your head. I couldn't represent
you if there was to be a fight with Anne. But we can fight these idiotic
charities, can't we?"
"No," said Braden flatly. "My grandfather's will is to stand just as it
is, Simmy. I shall not contest for a cent. And so, if you please, there's
no reason for my going down there to listen to the reading of the thing. I
know pretty well what the document says. I was in Mr. Thorpe's confidence.
For your own edification, Simmy, I'll merely say that I have already had
my share of the estate, and I'm satisfied."
"Still, in common decency, you ought to go down and listen to the reading
of the will. Judge Hollenback says he will put the thing off until you are
present, so you might as well go first as last. Be reasonable, Brady. I
know how you feel toward Anne. I can appreciate your unwillingness to go
to her house after what happened a year ago. Judge Hollenback declares
that his letter of instruction from Mr. Thorpe makes it obligatory for him
to read the document in the presence of his widow and his grandson, and in
the library of his late home. Otherwise, the thing could have been done in
Hollenback's offices."
In the end Braden agreed to be present.
When Judge Hollenback smoothed out the far from voluminous looking
document, readjusted his nose glasses and cleared his throat preparatory
to reading, the following persons were seated in the big, fire-lit
library: Anne Thorpe, the widow; Braden Thorpe, the grandson; Mrs.
Tresslyn, George Tresslyn, Simmy Dodge, Murray, and Wade, the furnace-man.
The two Tresslyns were there by Anne's request. Late in the day she was
overcome by the thought of sitting there alone while Braden was being
dispossessed of all that rightfully belonged to him. She had not intended
to ask her mother to come down for the reading. Somehow she had felt that
Mrs. Tresslyn's presence would indicate the consummation of a project that
had something ignoble about it. She knew that her mother could experience
no other sensation than that of curiosity in listening to the will. Her
interest in the affairs of Templeton Thorpe ended with the signing of the
ante-nuptial contract, supplemented of course by the event which
satisfactorily terminated the agreement inside of a twelve-month. But
Anne, practically alone in the world as she now found herself to be, was
suddenly aware of a great sense of depression. She wanted her mother. She
wanted some one near who would not look at her with scornful, bitter eyes.
George's presence is to be quickly explained. He had spent the better part
of the week with Anne, sleeping in the house at her behest. For a week she
had braved it out alone. Then came the sudden surrender to dread, terror,
loneliness. The shadows in the halls were grim; the sounds in the night
were sinister, the stillness that followed them creepy; the servants were
things that stalked her, and she was afraid—mortally afraid in this home
that was not hers. She had made up her mind to go away for a long time
just as soon as everything was settled.
As for the furnace-man, Judge Hollenback had summoned him on his arrival
at the house. So readily had Wade adapted himself to his new duties that
he now felt extremely uncomfortable and ill-at-ease in a room that had
been like home to him for thirty years. He seemed to feel that this was no
place for the furnace-man, notwithstanding the scouring and polishing
process that temporarily had restored him to a more exalted office,—for
once more he was the smug, impeccable valet.
Braden was the last to arrive. He timed his arrival so that there could be
no possibility of an informal encounter with Anne. She came forward and
shook hands with him, simply, unaffectedly.
"You have been away," she said, looking straight into his eyes. He was
conscious of a feeling of relief. He had been living in some dread of what
he might detect in her eyes. But it was a serene, frank expression that he
found in them, not a question.
"Yes," he said. "I was tired," he added after a moment.
She hesitated. Then: "I have not seen you, Braden, since—since the twenty-
first. You have not given me the opportunity to tell you that I know you
did all that any one could possibly do for Mr. Thorpe. Thank you for
undertaking the impossible. I am sorry—oh, so sorry,—that you were made to
suffer. I want you to remember too that it was with my sanction that you
made the hopeless effort."
He turned cold. The others had heard every word. She had spoken without
reserve, without the slightest indication of nervousness or compunction.
The very thing that he feared had come to pass. She had put herself
definitely on record. He glanced quickly about, searching the faces of the
other occupants of the room. His gaze fell upon Wade, and rested for a
second or two. Something told him that Wade's gaze would shift,—and it
did.
"I did everything, Anne. Thank you for believing in me." That was all. No
word of sympathy, no mawkish mumbling of regret, no allusion to his own
loss. He looked again into her eyes, this time in quest of the motive that
urged her to make this unnecessary declaration. Was there a deeper
significance to be attached to her readiness to assume responsibility? He
looked for the light in her eye that would convince him that she was
taking this stand because of the love she felt for him. He was
immeasurably relieved to find no secret message there. She had not stooped
to that, and he was gratified. Her eyes were clouded with concern for him,
that was all. He was ashamed of himself for the thought,—and afterwards he
wondered why he should have been ashamed. After all, it was only right
that she should be sorry for him. He deserved that much from her.
An awkward silence ensued. Simmy Dodge coughed nervously, and then Braden
advanced to greet Mrs. Tresslyn. She did not rise. Her gloved hand was
extended and he took it without hesitation.
"It is good to see you again, Braden," she said, with the bland,
perfunctory parting of the lips that stands for a smile with women of her
class. He meant nothing to her now.
"Thanks," he said, and moved on to George, who regarded him with some
intensity for a moment and then gripped his hand heartily. "How are you,
George?"
"Fine! First stage of regeneration, you know. I'm glad to see you, Brady."
There was such warmth in the repressed tones that Thorpe's hand clasp
tightened. Tresslyn was still a friend. His interest quickened into a keen
examination of the young man who had pronounced himself in the first stage
of regeneration, whatever that may have signified to one of George's type.
He was startled by the haggard, sick look in the young fellow's face.
George must have read the other's expression, for he said: "I'm all
right,—just a little run down. That's natural, I suppose."
"He has a dreadful cold," said Anne, who had overheard. "I can't get him
to do anything for it."
"Don't you worry about me, Anne," said George stoutly.
"Just the same, you should take care of yourself," said Braden. "Pneumonia
gets after you big fellows, you know. How are you, Wade? Poor old Wade,
you must miss my grandfather terribly. You knew him before I was born. It
seems an age, now that I think of it in that way."
"Thirty-three years, sir," said Wade. "Nearly ten years longer than
Murray, Mr. Braden, It does seem an age."
The will was not a lengthy document. The reading took no more than three
minutes, and for another full minute after its conclusion, not a person in
the room uttered a word. A sort of stupefaction held them all in its
grip,—that is, all except the old lawyer who was putting away his glasses
and waiting for the outburst that was sure to follow.
In the first place, Mr. Thorpe remembered Anne. After declaring that she
had been satisfactorily provided for in a previous document, known to her
as a contract, he bequeathed to her the house in which she had lived for a
single year with him. All of its contents went with this bequest. To
Josiah Wade he left the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars, to Edward
Murray ten thousand dollars, and to each of the remaining servants in his
household a sum equal to half of their earnings while in his service.
There were bequests to his lawyer, his doctor and his secretary, besides
substantial gifts to persons who could not by any chance have expected
anything from this grim old man,—such as the friendly doorman at his
favourite club, and the man who had been delivering newspapers to him for
a score of years or more, and the old negro bootblack who had attended him
at the Brevoort in the days before the Italian monopoly set in, and the
two working-girls who supported the invalid widow of a man who had gone to
prison and died there after having robbed the Thorpe estate of a great
many thousands of dollars while acting as a confidential and trusted
agent.
Then came the astounding disposition of the fortune that had accumulated
in the time of Templeton Thorpe. There were no bequests outright to
charity, contrary to all expectations. The listeners were prepared to hear
of huge gifts to certain institutions and societies known to have been
favoured by the testator. Various hospitals were looked upon as sure to
receive splendid endowments, and specific colleges devoted to the
advancement of medical and surgical science were also regarded as
inevitable beneficiaries. It was all cut and dried, so far as Judge
Hollenback's auditors were concerned,—that is to say, prior to the reading
of the will. True, the old lawyer had declared in the beginning, that the
present will was drawn and signed on the afternoon of the day before the
death of Mr. Thorpe, and that a previous instrument to which a codicil had
been affixed was destroyed in the presence of two witnesses. The
instrument witnessed by Wade and Murray was the one that had been
destroyed. This should have aroused uneasiness in the mind of Braden
Thorpe, if no one else, but he was slow to recognise the significance of
the change in his grandfather's designs.
With his customary terseness, Templeton Thorpe declared himself to be
hopelessly ill but of sound mind at the moment of drawing his last will
and testament, and suffering beyond all human endurance. His condition at
that moment, and for weeks beforehand, was such that death offered the
only panacea. He had come to appreciate the curse of a life prolonged
beyond reason. Therefore, in full possession of all his faculties and
being now irrevocably converted to the principles of mercy advocated by
his beloved grandson, Braden Lanier Thorpe, he placed the residue of his
estate in trust, naming the aforesaid Braden Lanier Thorpe as sole
trustee, without bond, the entire amount to be utilised and expended by
him in the promotion of his noble and humane propaganda in relation to the
fate of the hopelessly afflicted among those creatures fashioned after the
image of God. The trust was to expire with the death of the said Braden
Lanier Thorpe, when all funds remaining unused for the purposes herein set
forth were to go without restriction to the heirs of the said trustee,
either by bequest or administration.
In so many words, the testator rested in his grandson full power and
authority to use these funds, amounting to nearly six million dollars, as
he saw fit in the effort to obtain for the human sufferer the same mercy
that is extended to the beast of the field, and to make final disposition
of the estate in his own will. Realising the present hopelessness of an
attempt to secure legislation of this character, he suggested that first
of all it would be imperative to prepare the way to such an end by
creating in the minds of all the peoples of the world a state of common
sense that could successfully combat and overcome love, sentimentality and
cowardice! For these three, he pointed out, were the common enemy of
reason. "And in compensation for the discharge of such duties as may come
under the requirements of this trusteeship, the aforesaid Braden Lanier
Thorpe shall receive the fees ordinarily allotted by law and, in addition,
the salary of twenty-five thousand dollars per annum, until the terms of
this instrument are fully carried out."
Anne Tresslyn Thorpe was named as executrix of the will.