OPINIONS AND THEORIES
Mr. and Mrs. Rufus Gray were the last to leave the city, after the
house-party. They returned to their brother Robert's home for a day,
when the other guests had gone, and it was on the evening before their
departure that they related their experiences while at the house of
Matthew Kendrick. With most of the members of the Gray household, they
were sitting before the fire in the living-room when Aunt Ruth suddenly
spoke her mind.
"I don't know when I've felt so sorry for the too rich as I felt in that
house," said she. She was knitting a gray silk mitten, and her needles
were flying.
"Why, Aunt Ruth?" inquired her nephew Louis, who sat next her, revelling
in the comfort of home after a particularly harassing day at the office.
"Did they seem to lack anything in particular?"
"I should say they did," she replied. "Nothing that money can buy, of
course, but about everything that it can't."
"For instance?" he pursued, turning affectionate eyes upon his aunt's
small figure in its gray gown, as the firelight played upon it, touching
her abundant silvering locks and making her eyes seem to sparkle almost
as brilliantly as her swiftly moving needles.
Aunt Ruth put down her knitting for an instant, looking at her nephew.
"Why, you know," said she. "You're sitting in the very middle of it this
minute!"
Louis looked about him, smiling. He was, indeed, in the midst of an
accustomed scene of both home-likeness and beauty. The living-room was
of such generous proportions that even when the entire family were
gathered there they could not crowd it. On a wide couch, at one side of
the fireplace, sat his father and mother, talking in low tones
concerning some matter of evident interest, to judge by their intent
faces. Rosamond, like the girl she resembled, sat, girl fashion, on a
pile of cushions close by the fire; and Stephen, her husband, not far
away, by a table with a drop-light, was absorbed in a book. Uncle Rufus
was examining a pile of photographs on the other side of the table. Ted
sprawled on a couch at the far end of the room, deep in a boy's
magazine, a reading light at his elbow. At the opposite end of the room,
where the piano stood, Roberta, music rack before her, was drawing her
bow across nearly noiseless strings, while Ruth picked softly at her
harp: indications of intention to burst forth into musical strains when
a hush should chance to fall upon the company.
Judge Calvin Gray alone was absent from the gathering, and even as
Louis's eyes wandered about the pleasant room, his uncle's figure
appeared in the doorway. As if he were answering his sister Ruth, Judge
Gray spoke his thought.
"I wonder," said he, advancing toward the fireside, "if anywhere in this
wide world there is a happier family life than this!"
Louis sprang up to offer Judge Gray the chair he had been occupying--a
favourite, luxuriously cushioned armchair, with a reading light beside
it ready to be switched on at will, which was Uncle Calvin's special
treasure, of an evening. Louis himself took up his position on the
hearth-rug, opposite Rosamond.
Aunt Ruth answered her brother energetically: "None happier, Calvin,
I'll warrant, and few half as happy. I can't help wishing those two
people Rufus and I've been visiting could look in here just now."
"Why make them envious?" suggested Louis, who loved to hear his Aunt
Ruth's crisp speeches.
"The question is--would they be envious?" This came from Stephen, whose
absorption in his book evidently admitted of penetration from the
outside.
"Why, of course they would!" declared Aunt Ruth. "You should have seen
the way they had me pour the coffee and tea, all the while I was there.
That young man Richard was always getting me to pour something--said he
liked to see me do it. And he was always sending a servant off and doing
things for me himself. If I'd been a young girl he couldn't have hovered
round any more devotedly."
A general laugh greeted this, for Aunt Ruth's expression of face as she
told it was provocative.
"We can readily believe that, Ruth," declared Judge Gray, and his
brother Robert nodded. The low-voiced talk between Mr. Robert Gray and
his wife had ceased; Stephen had laid down his book; Ruth had stopped
plucking at her harp strings; and only Roberta still seemed interested
in anything but Aunt Ruth and her experiences and opinions.
"I mended his socks and gloves for him," announced Aunt Ruth
contentedly. "You needn't tell me they don't miss a woman's hand about
the house, over there."
"She mended Rich Kendrick's socks and gloves!" murmured Louis, with a
laughing, incredulous glance at Rosamond, who lifted delighted eyes to
him. "I can't believe it. He must have made holes in them on purpose."
"Why, not even a spendthrift would do that!" Aunt Ruth promptly denied
the possibility of such folly. "I don't say but they are lavish with
things there. Rufus and I were a good deal bothered by all their lights.
We couldn't seem to get them all put out. And every time we put them
out, anywhere, somebody'd turn them on again for us."
Uncle Rufus broke in here, narrating their experience with the various
switch-buttons in the suite of rooms, and the company laughed until they
wept over his comments.
"But all that's neither here nor there," said he, finally. "Of course we
weren't up to such elaborate arrangements, and it made us feel sort of
rustic. But I can tell you they didn't spare any pains to make us
comfortable and at home--if, as Ruth says, you can make anybody feel at
home in a great place like that. I feel, as she does, sorry for 'em
both. They're pretty fine gentlemen, if I'm any judge, and I don't know
which I like better, the older or the younger."
"There can be no question about the older," said his brother, Robert
Gray, joining in the talk with evident interest. "Mr. Matthew Kendrick
made his place long ago in the business world as one of the great and
just. He has taught that world many fine lessons of truth and honour, as
well as of success."
Judge Gray nodded. "I'm glad to hear that you appreciate him, Robert,"
said he. "Few know better than I how deserved that is. And still fewer
recognize the fine and sensitive nature behind the impression of power
he has always given. He is the type of man, as sister Ruth here is quick
to discern, who must be lonely in the midst of his great wealth, for the
lack of just such a privilege as this we have here to-night, the close
association with people whom we love, and with whom we sympathize in all
that matters most. Matthew Kendrick was a devoted husband and father. In
spite of his grandson's presence, of late, he must sorely long for
companionship."
"His grandson's going to give him more of that than he has," declared
Aunt Ruth, smiling over her knitting as if recalling a pleasant memory.
"He and I had quite a bit of talk while I was there, and he's beginning
to realize that he owes his grandfather more than he's given him. I had
a good chance to see what was in that boy's heart, and I know there's
plenty of warmth there. And there's real character in him, too. I've had
enough sons of my own to know the signs, and the fact that they were
poor in this world's goods, and he is rich--too rich--doesn't make a
mite of difference in the signs!"
Mrs. Robert Gray, who had been listening with an intent expression in
eyes whose beauty was not more appealing than their power of observation
was keen, now spoke, and all turned to her. She was a woman whose
opinion on any subject of common interest was always waited for and
attended upon. Her voice was rich and low--her family did not fully know
how dear to their ears was the sound of that voice.
"Young Mr. Kendrick," said she, "couldn't wish, Ruth, for a more
powerful advocate than you. To have you approve him, after seeing him
under more intimate circumstances than we are likely to do, must commend
him to our good will. To tell the frank truth, I have been rather afraid
to admit him to my good graces, lest there be really no great force of
character, or even promise of it, behind that handsome face and winning
manner. But if you see the signs--as you say--we must look more
hopefully upon him."
"She's not the only one who sees signs," asserted Judge Gray. "He's
coming on--he's coming on well, in his work with me. He's learning
really to work. I admit he didn't know how when he came to me. Something
has waked him up. I'm inclined to think," he went on, with a mischievous
glance toward the end of the room where sat the noiseless musicians, "it
might have been my niece Roberta's shining example of industry when she
spent a day with us in my library, typing work for me back in October.
Never was such a sight to serve as an inspiration for a laggardly young
man!"
There was a general laugh, and all eyes were turned toward that end of
the room devoted to the users of the musical instruments. In response
came a deep, resonant note from Roberta's 'cello, over which the silent
bow had been for some time suspended. There followed a minor scale,
descending well into the depths and vibrating dismally as it went.
Louis, a mocking light in his eye, strolled down the room to his
sisters.
"That's the way you feel about it, eh?" he queried, regarding Roberta
with brotherly interest. "Consigning the poor, innocent chap to the
bottom of the ladder, when he's doing his best to climb up to the
sunshine of your smile. Have you no respect for the opinion of your
betters?"
"Get out your fiddle and play the Grieg _Danse Caprice_, with us," was
her reply, and Louis obeyed, though not without a word or two more in
her ear which made her lift her bow threateningly. Presently the trio
were off, playing with a spirit and dash which drew all ears, and at the
close of the _Danse_ hearty applause called for more. After this
diversion, naturally enough, new subjects came up for discussion.
Returning to the living-room in search of a dropped letter, after the
family had dispersed for the night, Roberta found her mother lingering
there alone. She had drawn a low chair close to the fire, and, having
extinguished all other lights, was sitting quietly looking into the
still glowing embers. Roberta, forgetting her quest, came close, and
flinging a cushion at her mother's knee dropped down there. This was a
frequent happening, and the most intimate hours the two spent together
were after this fashion.
There was no speech for a little, though Mrs. Gray's hand wandered
caressingly about her daughter's neck in a way Roberta dearly loved,
drawing the loosened dark locks away from the small ears, or twisting a
curly strand about her fingers. Suddenly the girl burst out:
"Mother, what are you to do when you find all your theories upset?"
"_All_ upset?" repeated Mrs. Gray, in her rich and quiet voice. "That
would be a calamity indeed. Surely there must be one or two of yours
remaining stable?"
"It seems not, just now. One disproved overturns another. They all hinge
on one another--at least mine do."
"Perhaps not as closely as you think. What is it, dear? Can you tell me
anything about it?"
"Not much, I'm afraid. Oh, it's nothing very real, I suppose--just a
sort of vague discomfort at feeling that certain ideals I thought were
as fixed as the stars in the heavens seem to be wobbling as if they
might shoot downward any minute, and--and leave only a trail of light
behind!"
The last words came on a note of rather shaky laughter. Roberta's arm
lay across her mother's knee, her head upon it. She turned her head
downward for an instant, burying her face in the angle of her arm. Mrs.
Gray regarded the mass of dark locks beneath her hand with a look amused
yet sympathetic.
"That sort of discomfort attacks us all, at times," she said. "Ideals
change and develop with our growth. One would not want the same ones to
serve her all her life."
"I know. But when it's not a new and better ideal which displaces the
old one, but only--an attraction--"
"An attraction not ideal?"
Roberta shook her head. "I'm afraid not. And I don't see why it should
be an attraction at all. It ought not to be, if my ideals have been what
they should have been. And they have. Why, you gave them to me, mother,
many of them--or at least helped me to work them out for myself. And
I--I had confidence in them!"
"And they're shaken?"
"Not the ideals--they're all the same. Only--they don't seem to be proof
against--assault. Oh, I'm talking in riddles, I know. I don't want to
put any of it into words, it makes it seem more real. And it's only a
shadowy sort of difficulty. Maybe that's all it will be."
Mothers are wonderful at divination; why should they not be, when all
their task is a training in understanding young natures which do not
understand themselves. From these halting phrases of mystery Mrs. Gray
gathered much more than her daughter would have imagined. But she did
not let that be seen.
"If it is only a shadowy difficulty the rising of the sun will put it to
flight," she predicted.
Roberta was silent for a space. Then suddenly she sat up.
"I had a long letter from Forbes Westcott to-day," she said, in a tone
which tried to be casual. "He's staying on in London, getting material
for that difficult Letchworth case he's so anxious to win. It's a
wonderfully interesting letter, though he doesn't say much about the
case. He's one of the cleverest letter writers I ever knew--in the
flesh. It's really an art with him. If he hadn't made a lawyer of
himself he would have been a man of letters, his literary tastes are so
fine. It's quite an education in the use of delightfully spirited
English, a correspondence with him. I've appreciated that more with each
letter."
She produced the letter. "Just listen to this account of an interview he
had with a distinguished Member of Parliament, the one who has just made
that daring speech in the House that set everybody on fire." And she
read aloud from several closely written pages, holding the sheets toward
the still bright embers, and giving the words the benefit of her own
clear and understanding interpretation. Her mother listened with
interest.
"That is, indeed, a fine description," she agreed. "There is no question
that Forbes has a brilliant mind. The position he already occupies
testifies to that, and the older men all acknowledge that he is rising
more rapidly than could be expected of any ordinary man. He will be one
of the great men of the legal profession, your father and uncle think, I
know."
"One of the great men," repeated Roberta, her face still bent over her
letter. "I suppose there's no doubt at all of that. And, mother--you may
imagine that when he sets himself to persuade--any one--to--any course,
he knows how to put it as irresistibly as words can."
"Yes, I should imagine that, dear," said her mother, her eyes on the
down-bent profile, whose outlines, against the background of the
firelight, would have held a gaze less loving than her own.
"His age makes him interesting, you know," pursued Roberta. "He's just
enough older--and maturer--than any of the men I know, to make him seem
immensely more worth while. His very looks--that thin, keen face of
his--it's plain, yet attractive, and his eyes look as if they could
see through stone walls. It flatters you to have him seem to find
the things you say worth listening to. I can't just explain his
peculiar--fascination--I really think it is that, except that it's his
splendid mind that grips yours, somehow. Oh, I sound like a,
schoolgirl," she burst out, "in spite of my twenty-four years. I wonder
if you see what I mean."
"I think I do," said her mother, smiling a little. "You mean that your
judgment approves him, but that your heart lags a little behind?"
"How did you know?" Roberta folded her arms upon her mother's lap, and
looked up eagerly into her face. "I didn't say anything about my heart."
"But you did, dear. The very fact that you can discuss him so coolly
tells me that your heart isn't seriously involved as yet. Is it?"
"That's what I don't know," said the girl. "When he writes like
this--the last two pages I can't read to you--I don't know what I think.
And I'm not used to not knowing what I think! It's disconcerting. It's
like being taken off your feet and--not set down again. Yet, when I'm
with him--I'm not at all sure I should ever want him nearer than--well,
than three feet away. And he's so insistent--persistent. He wants an
answer--now, by mail."
"Are you ready to give it?"
"No. I'm afraid to give it--at long distance."
"Then do not. You are under no obligation to do that. The test of actual
presence is the only one to apply. Let him wait till he comes home. It
will not hurt him."
She spoke with spirit, and her daughter responded to the tone.
"I know that's the best advice," Roberta said, getting to her feet.
"Mother, you like him?"
"Yes, I have always liked Forbes," said Mrs. Gray, with cordiality.
"Your father likes him, and trusts him, as a man of honour, in his
profession. That is much to say. Whether he is a man who would make you
happy--that is a different question. No one can answer that but
yourself."
"I haven't wanted any one to make me happy." Roberta stood upon the
hearth-rug, a figure of charm among the lights and shadows. "I've been
absorbed in my work--and my play. I enjoy my men friends--and am glad
when they go away and leave me. Life is so full--and rich--just of
itself. There are so many wonderful people, of all sorts. The world is
so interesting--and home is so dear!" She lifted her arms, her head up.
"Mother, let's play the Bach _Air_," she said. "That always takes the
fever out of me, and makes me feel calm and rational. Is it very
late?--are you too tired? Nobody will be disturbed at this distance."
"I should love to play it," said Mrs. Gray, and together the two went
down the room to the great piano which stood there in the darkness.
Roberta switched on one hooded light, produced the music for her mother,
and tuned her 'cello, sitting at one side away from the light, with no
notes before her. Presently the slow, deep, and majestic notes of the
"Air for the G String" were vibrating through the quiet room, the 'cello
player drawing her bow across and across the one string with affection
for each rich note in her very touch. The other string tones followed
her with exquisite sympathy, for Mrs. Gray was a musician from whom
three of her four children had inherited an intense love for harmonic
values.
But a few bars had sounded when a tall figure came noiselessly into the
room, and Mr. Robert Gray dropped into the seat before the fire which
his wife had lately occupied. With head thrown back he listened, and
when silence fell at the close of the performance, his deep voice was
the first to break it.
"To me," he said, "that is the slow flowing and receding of waves upon a
smooth and rocky shore. The sky is gray, but the atmosphere is warm and
friendly. It is all very restful, after a day of perturbation."
"Oh, is it like that to you?" queried Roberta softly, out of the
darkness. "To me it's as if I were walking down the nave of a great
cathedral--Westminster, perhaps--big and bare and wonderful, with the
organ playing ever so far away. The sun is shining outside and so it's
not gloomy, only very peaceful, and one can't imagine the world at the
doors." She looked over at her mother, whose face was just visible in
the shaded light. "What is it to you, lovely lady?"
"It is a prayer," said her mother slowly, "a prayer for peace and purity
in a restless world, yet a prayer for service, too. The one who prays
lies very low, with his face concealed, and his spirit is full of
worship."
The light was put out; the three, father, mother, and daughter, came
together in the fading fire-glow. Roberta laid a warm young hand upon the
shoulder of each. "You dears," she said, "what fortunate and happy
children your four are, to be the children of you!"
Her father placed his firm fingers under her chin, lifting her face.
"Your mother and I," said he, "consider ourselves fairly fortunate and
happy to be the parents of you. You are an interesting quartette. 'Age
cannot wither nor custom stale' your 'infinite variety.' But age will
wither you if you often sit up to play Bach at midnight, when you must
teach school next day. Therefore, good-night, Namesake!"
Yet when she had gone, her father and mother lingered by the last embers
of the fire.
"God give her wisdom!" said Roberta's mother.
"He will--with you to ask Him," replied Roberta's father, with his arms
about his wife. "I think He never refuses you anything! I don't see how
He could!"