"Then I must, you think----"
The shrewd surgeon recognized Fear in the young man's voice. Quick the
thrill shot through his nerves, and he cried, "I will operate, _now_."
In half an hour it was over, and the Master and the surgeon were leaving
the village, climbing up by the steep path under the blazing noon sun.
The Master glanced at the man by his side, who strode along confidently,
a trifle of a swagger in his buoyant steps. The Master remarked:
"The test came, and you took it--splendidly."
"Yes," the great surgeon replied, smiling happily, "it's all there,
Doctor, the old power. I believe I am about ready to get into harness
again!" After they had walked more of the way without speaking, the
surgeon added, as to himself--"But there are other things to be feared!"
Though the Master looked at him closely he invited no explanation, and
they finished their homeward walk without remark.
* * * * *
It soon got about among the inmates of the Inn what a wonderful
operation the surgeon of St. Jerome's had performed, and it was rumored
that at the beginning of autumn he would go back to his old position.
Meantime the great surgeon enjoyed the homage that men always pay to
power, the consideration of his fellows. He had been much liked; but
now that the Brothers knew how soon he was to leave them, they
surrounded him with those attentions that men most love, elevating him
almost to the rank of the Master--and they feared him less. His fame
spread, so that from some mill beyond Stowe they brought to the Inn a
desperate case, and the surgeon operated again successfully,
demonstrating that he was once more master of his art, and master of
himself. So he stayed on merely to enjoy his triumph and escape the dull
season in the city.
It was a wonderful summer, that! The fitful temper of the north played
in all its moods. There were days when the sun shone tropically down
into the valleys, without a breath of air, when the earthy, woody
smells were strong--and the nights--perfect stillness and peace, as if
some spirit of the air were listening for love words on the earth. The
great elms along Albany road hung their branches motionless, and when
the moon came over behind the house the great hills began to swim
ghostly, vague--beyond, always beyond!... And then there were the fierce
storms that swept up the valley and hung growling along the hills for
days, and afterward, sky-washed and clear, the westerly breeze would
come tearing down the Intervale, drying the earth before it.... But each
day there was a change in the sound and the smell of the fields and the
woods--in the quick race of the northern summer--a change that the
surgeon, fishing up the tiny streams, felt and noted. Each day, so
radiant with its abundant life, sounded some under-note of fulfilment
and change--speaking beforehand of death to come.
Toward the end of August a snap of cold drove us in-doors for the night
meal. Then around the fire there was great talk between the Master and
the surgeon, a sort of battle of the soul, to which we others paid
silent attention. For wherever those nights the talk might rise, in the
little rills of accidental words, it always flowed down to the deep
underlying thoughts of men. And in those depths, as I said, these two
wrestled with each other. The Master, who had grown silent of late
years, woke once more with fire. The light, keen thrusts of the
surgeon, who argued like a fencer, roused his whole being; and as day by
day it went on we who watched saw that in a way the talk of these two
men set forth the great conflict of conflicts, that deepest fissure of
life and belief anent the Soul and the Body. And the Master, who had
lived his faiths by his life before our eyes, was being worsted in the
argument! The great surgeon had the better mind, and he had seen all of
life that one may see with eyes....
They were talking of the day of departure for the distinguished guest,
and arranging for some kind of triumphal procession to escort him to
White River. But he would not set the time, shrinking from this act, as
if all were not yet done. There came a warm, glowing day early in
September, and at night after the pipes were lighted the surgeon and the
Master strolled off in the direction of the pool, arm in arm. There had
been no talk that day, the surgeon apparently shrinking from coming to
the last grapple with one whose faiths were so important to him as the
Master's.
"The flowers are dying: they tell me it's time to move on," said the
surgeon. "And yet, my dear host, I go without the Secret, without
understanding All!"
"Perhaps there is no inner Secret," the Master smiled. "It is all here
before you."
"I know that--you have been very good to me, shared everything. If I
have not learned the Secret, it is my fault, my incapacity. But--" and
the gay tone dropped quickly and a flash of bitterness succeeded--"I at
least know that there _is_ a Secret!"
They sat down on the marble bench and looked into the water, each
thinking his thoughts. Suddenly the surgeon began to speak, hesitantly,
as if there had long been something in his mind that he was compelled to
say.
"My friend," he said, "I too have something to tell--the cause within
the cause, the reason of the reason--at least, sometimes I think it is!
The root reason for all--unhappiness, defeat, for the shaking hand and
the jesting voice. And I want you to hear it--if you will."
The Master raised his face from the pool but said never a word. The
surgeon continued, his voice trembling at times, though he spoke
slowly, evidently trying to banish all feeling.
"It is a common enough story at the start, at least among men of our
kind. You know that I was trained largely in Europe. My father had the
means to give me the best, and time to take it in. So I was over there,
before I came back to St. Jerome's, three, four years at Paris, Munich,
Vienna, all about.... While I was away I lived as the others, for the
most part--you know our profession--and youth. The rascals are pretty
much the same to-day, I judge from what my friends say of their sons!
Well, at least I worked like the devil, and was decent.... Oh, it isn't
for that I'm telling the tale! I was ambitious, then. And the time came
to go back, as it does in the end, and I took a few weeks' run through
Italy as a final taste of the lovely European thing, and came down to
Naples to get the boat for New York. I've never been back to Naples
since, and that was twenty-six years ago this autumn. But I can see the
city always as it was then! The seething human hive--the fellows piling
in the freight to the music of their songs--the fiery mouth of Vesuvius
up above. And the soft, dark night with just a plash of waves on the
quay!"
The Master listened, his eyes again buried in the water at their feet.
"Well, _she_ was there on board, of course--looking out also into that
warm dark night and sighing for all that was to be lost so soon. There
were few passengers in those days.... She was my countrywoman, and
beautiful, and there was something--at least so I thought then--of
especial sweetness in her eyes, something strong in her heart. She was
engaged to a man living somewhere in the States, and she was going back
to marry him. Why she was over there then I forget, and it is of no
importance. I think that the man was a doctor, too--in some small
city.... I loved her!"
The Master raised his eyes from the pool and leaning on his folded arms
looked into the surgeon's face.
"I am afraid I never thought much about that other fellow--never have to
this day! That was part of the brute I am--to see only what is before my
eyes. And I knew by the time we had swung into the Atlantic that I
wanted that woman as I had never wanted things before. She stirred me,
mind and all. Of course it might have been some one else--any one you
will say--and if she had been an ordinary young girl, it might have gone
differently? It is one of the things we can't tell in this life. There
was something in that woman that was big all through and roused the
spirit in me. I never knew man or woman who thirsted more for greatness,
for accomplishment. Perhaps the man she was to marry gave her little to
hope for--probably it was some raw boy-and-girl affair such as we have
in America.... The days went by, and it was clearer to both of us what
must be. But we didn't speak of it. She found in me, I suppose, the
power, the sort of thing she had missed in the other. I was to do all
those grand things she was so hot after. I have done some of them too.
But that was when she had gone and I no longer needed her.... I needed
her then, and I took her--that is all.
"The detail is old and dim--and what do you care to hear of a young
man's loves! Before we reached port it was understood between us. I told
her I wanted her to leave the other chap--he was never altogether clear
to me--and to marry me as soon as she could. We did not stumble or slide
into it, not in the least: we looked it through and through--that was
her kind and mine. How she loved to look life in the face! I have found
few women who like that.... In the end she asked me not to come near
her the last day. She would write me the day after we had landed, either
yes or no. So she kissed me, and we parted still out at sea."
All the Brothers had left the court and the arcades, where they had been
strolling, and old Sam was putting out the Inn lights. But the two men
beside the pool made no movement. The west wind still drew in down the
valley with summer warmth and ruffled the water at their feet.
"My father met me at the dock--you know he was the first surgeon at St.
Jerome's before me. My mother was with him.... But as she kissed me I
was thinking of that letter.... I knew it would come. Some things must!
Well, it came."
The silent listener bent his head, and the surgeon mused on his
passionate memory. At last the Master whispered in a low voice that
hardly reached into the night:
"Did you make her happy?"
The surgeon did not answer the question at once.
"Did you make her happy?" the old man demanded again, and his voice
trembled this time with such intensity that his companion looked at him
wonderingly. And in those dark eyes of the Master's he read something
that made him shrink away. Then for the third time the old man demanded
sternly:
"Tell me--did you make her happy?"
It was the voice of one who had a right to know, and the surgeon
whispered back slowly:
"Happy? No, my God! Perhaps at first, in the struggle, a little. But
afterward there was too much--too many things. It went, the inspiration
and the love. I broke her heart--she left me! That--that is _my_
Reason!"
"It _is_ the Reason! For you took all, all--you let her give all, and
you gave her--what?"
"Nothing--she died."
"I know--she died."
The Master had risen, and with folded arms faced his guest, a pitying
look in his eyes. The surgeon covered his face with his hands, and after
a long time said:
"So you knew this?"
"Yes, I knew!"
"And knowing you let me come here. You took me into your house, you
healed me, you gave me back my life!"
And the Master replied with a firm voice:
"I knew, and I gave you back your life." In a little while he explained
more softly: "You and I are no longer young men who feel hotly and
settle such a matter with hate. We cannot quarrel now for the possession
of a woman.... She chose: remember that!... It was twenty-six years this
September. We have lived our lives, you and I; we have lived out our
lives, the good and the evil. Why should we now for the second time add
passion to sorrow?"
"And yet knowing all you took me in!"
"Yes!" the old man cried almost proudly. "And I have made you again
what you once were.... What _she_ loved as you," he added to himself, "a
man full of Power."
Then they were speechless in face of the fact: the one had taken all and
the sweet love turned to acid in his heart, and the other had lost and
the bitter turned to sweet! When a long time had passed the surgeon
spoke timidly:
"It might have been so different for her with you! You loved her--more."
There was the light of a compassionate smile on the Master's lips as he
replied:
"Yes, I loved her, too."
"And it changed things--for you!"
"It changed things. There might have been my St. Jerome's--my fame also.
Instead, I came here with my boys. And here I shall die, please God."
The old Master then became silent, his face set in a dream of life, as
it was, as it would have been; while the great surgeon of St. Jerome's
thought such thoughts as had never passed before into his mind. The
night wind had died at this late hour, and in its place there was a
coldness of the turning season. The stars shone near the earth and all
was silent with the peace of mysteries. The Master looked at the man
beside him and said calmly:
"It is well as it is--all well!"
At last the surgeon rose and stood before the Master.
"I have learned the Secret," he said, "and now it is time for me to
go."
He went up to the house through the little court and disappeared within
the Inn, while the Master sat by the pool, his face graven like the face
of an old man, who has seen the circle of life and understands.... The
next morning there was much talk about Dr. Norton's disappearance, until
some one explained that the surgeon had been suddenly called back to the
city.
* * * * *
The news spread through the Brotherhood one winter that the old Inn had
been burned to the ground, a bitter December night when all the
water-taps were frozen. And the Master, who had grown deaf of late, had
been caught in his remote chamber, and burned or rather suffocated.
There were few men in the Inn at the time, it being the holiday season,
and when they had fought their way to the old man's room, they found him
lying on the lounge by the window, the lids fallen over the dark eyes
and his face placid with sleep or contemplation.... They sought in vain
for the reason of the fire--but why search for causes?
* * * * *
All those beautiful hills that we loved to watch as the evening haze
gathered, the Master left in trust for the people of the State--many
acres of waving forests. And the School continued in its old place, the
Brothers looking after its wants and supplying it with means to continue
its work. But the Inn was never rebuilt. The blackened ruins of
buildings were removed and the garden in the court extended so that it
covered the whole space where the Inn had stood. This was enclosed with
a thick plantation of firs on all sides but that one which looked
westward across the Intervale. The spot can be seen for miles around on
the Albany hill side.
And when it was ready--all fragrant and radiant with flowers--they
placed the Master there beside the pool, where he had loved to sit,
surrounded by men. On the sunken slab his title was engraved--