Fessenden, until his Great Love Affair, which occurred when he had
rounded his seventeenth year, lived in his books and the future,
finding less and less companionship in his now humble and devoted
band of followers. This interval of four years was pricked out by two
variations only: the gradually discontinuing visits of his father and
the slight change incident upon a letter received from Mr. Abbott on
his son’s fifteenth birthday:
“MY DEAR BOY”--(this letter began, in the well-bred but curiously
unexercised handwriting which sometimes made Fessenden wonder if his
father never wrote to any one else)--“It may be some time, perhaps
years, before we meet again. I shall give you no reason now for this
additional separation, so painful to me. When the time comes I shall
explain, and you will find the explanation satisfactory. Meanwhile,
I shall write to you twice a year, remind you of all the advice and
admonition I have given you, and ask many questions. I am very much
gratified with Mr. Morris’s accounts of you. It is in your blood to
take naturally to books. I hope and pray that other things may come
as readily to you in due course.
“I have now concluded that you are old and strong enough to support
yourself--barring your tuition, which I shall manage to meet. I am
writing to Nettlebeck to put you to work during the fine weather. As
you know, I prefer you should not study during those months, and you
will be paid what will more than meet your expenses the year round.
You are quite equal to the work of a farm-hand, and it is time you
knew how it feels to earn money. It will also be a very considerable
relief to me, besides accustoming you to the fit of the harness
before it is imperatively necessary to put it on. Your sister is
well, and sends you her love. I add mine, and I beg you to believe
that in spite of appearances I love you devotedly--more than I have
ever loved any one. You ask for my picture. I have never had one
taken. I have my reasons. One is that a man always seems to me most
of an ass when smirking on cardboard.
“Your very affectionate
“FATHER.”
“He believes in disciplining,” remarked Fessenden to Morris, with some
acerbity. He was not enchanted at the prospect of being a farm-hand.
“If I must I must, but somehow I can’t believe my father is as poor as
he makes out. If he is poor, it must be because he wants to be, for it
always seems to me as if a sort of power came straight out of him, and
hit me hard. And up here, where all men are equal--quite unlike what
you say it is in cities--the Nettlebecks show him more respect than
they ever show any one else.”
“That is the mere force of personality. You can have the same
experience when you are grown, if you make of yourself a strong and
isolated spirit, not a mere creditable member of a type. As for your
father, his opinions are worth their weight in gold. Obey him without
question--therein lies the success of your future. He is not only a man
of remarkable brain-power, but he is between three and four times your
age. He is helping you now out of his own experience. Be thankful that
he takes so great an interest in you, instead of spoiling you in the
usual criminal American fashion.”
“His interest appears to be more excessive than his love.”
“Cannot you take love on trust?”
“Does anybody take anything on trust? Can I eat nails and believe them
bread? I know what I see, what I feel, what I am permitted to enjoy. I
might say to myself twenty times a day, ‘My father loves me,’ and it
wouldn’t make one-thousandth the impression that a weekly visit of ten
minutes would.”
“A weekly visit from Mr. Abbott--” Morris checked his laugh abruptly.
“Your father is not too strong, and hates travelling. But you have
brain and imagination; it is odd you should need the regularly
administered pap of the ordinary youth.”
“I am human,” responded Fessenden dryly; and as usual he went to
_Pocahontas_ for comfort and counsel.
The world was green on this birthday of his, for the spring had come
early. The snow had gone from the mountains, the young maple-leaves
were fluttering in the forest, the fields were green, the golden
sunshine flooded the lake. There was a light breeze, and Fessenden
unfurled his sails and thought into the sympathetic soul of his canoe.
“Perhaps, on the whole, I like the idea,” he admitted.
“With one or two exceptions, our great men have risen from the
ranks--were hired men, grocery-store clerks, born in log-cabins, and
all that sort of thing. To be sure, my favorites happen to be the ones
who were not; still it seems to be the proper thing in this country,
and as I intend to be a great man, old girl, I am contented to start
at the proper place--no log-hut could be uglier than the Nettlebeck
farm-house, and I am going to be a hired man, all right. I can’t help
being thankful that it isn’t to be a grocery-store clerk. What am I to
be? What am I to be? Can’t you give me a hint?” He laid his ear to the
spot where he fancied the heart of _Pocahontas_ beat warmly, and for
him alone. “When I read the life of a great warrior, I want to be one.
Upon some other occasion I want to be a great statesman and orator, and
spout the seventh-of-March speech in the woods, as exalted as if the
world listened--and feel like a fool afterwards. Write? Morris says
there are too many writers now, and that my brain is that of the man
of action. He certainly seems to know more about it than I do, and as
for you, my beauty, you’re a selfish hussy. When your sails are up you
think of nothing but filling your belly with wind.”