Between the date of Potter Waite's injury and the first of the new year
tremendous events occurred at home and abroad, and among the most
tremendous, the most hopeful to Potter, and to Americans who loved and
feared for their country, was the birth of the thing that came to be known
as the Plattsburg Idea. It was the one sign of life in an ocean of
lethargy; it showed that there were men not unaffected by sinister
manifestations--men who foresaw peril, men who were ready to give their
abilities and their lives for the safety of the flag that waved over their
prosperity. When history comes to be written the Plattsburg experiment
will stand out distinct, significant--a rainbow of promise.
Inert public opinion was preparing to stir. Germany, pursuing her
relentless way, chose to irritate a nation which it might have
conciliated. It irritated with patent propaganda; her Bernstorffs and
Dernbergs filled the public prints with their sophistry, while their paid
agents were fomenting industrial unrest and achieving arson and murder.
German bombs were discovered on outward-bound vessels; the German torch
was applied to factory and mill. Irritation increased, became acute to
such a point that Doctor Dumba, who had used his sacred station as
ambassador to shield his activities as arch plotter, was dismissed and
sent on his disgraced way Vienna-wards. Von Papen and Boy-Ed, red-handed,
were whisked away.... The _Arabic_ was sunk. Then it seemed that Germany
hesitated on her course. Mr. Wilson patiently indited note upon note, at
last wringing from the Imperial German government its solemn promise to
refrain from sinking liners without warning. This was heralded and
welcomed as a great victory for our diplomacy, and the country breathed
more easily. The cloud threatening the thunders and lightnings of war
passed around us harmlessly.
But Mr. Roosevelt would not let the country return to its sleep. His
alarm-voice rang in its ears, denouncing, demanding, stirring to
wakefulness.
The news from abroad had been depressing. For a year the western
battle-front had stood stationary, presenting a stalemate. The heralded
"big push" had failed, or what one might safely call failed. Russia was
being beaten into helplessness with a million prisoners captured since
May. Siberia had been stricken.
But Bernstorff and Dumba and Boy-Ed had not been without their value, as
Plattsburg had not been without its value. Preparedness was in the air. It
was a topic of conversation. It and the blind atrocity of the slaughter of
Edith Cavell.... The President's message in December dealt with
preparedness, naval and military, and promised much. Mr. Garrison had a
plan.... The inert mass of the people was no longer inert; it stirred,
moved, but did not awaken. Perhaps it was vexed by nightmare
visitations.... Henry Ford's heart made his head ridiculous with the
squabbling argosy aboard his peace ship.... All these things were straws
indicating not only the rising of the wind, but the direction of the
wind.... Potter Waite studied and appraised them at their true value.
He studied and weighed the manifestations of public consciousness in
Detroit, smug, wealthy, inaccessible Detroit. Detroit was on no exposed
coast; Detroit was safe from invasion; Detroit did not share the fears and
the excitement of the seaboard, but went on its way manufacturing
motor-cars and munitions, stoves and varnish, and piling up its wealth
fantastically, spending its wealth but never able to exhaust its income.
Submarine sinkings were academic affairs in Detroit; bomb plots, the
incitement of labor to violent unrest, the torch of the plotter, were
matters that affected her more nearly. There were those in high places who
knew that the stealthy eye of Germany's army of moles was on the city;
that they tunneled underneath the city's feet, sinister, frightful.... But
Detroit did not cry for war. She demanded protection in her activities.
Her German-Americans were loud in their talk. The hyphen had its definite
place among them. Potter watched and saw. Like the East, the Middle-West
was moving glacier-like toward a distant point. The moment would come when
glacier movement became avalanche rush.
Detroit continued to fly high.
Long before the new year Potter had discarded casts, bandages, crutches;
his body was as sound as ever it had been, more perfectly fit than his
habits had allowed it to be for years. There had been other changes for
the better--changes less easy to detect and to define. One might almost
have been justified in saying that he had not gotten well of his injuries,
but had been recreated. There is a spiritual rebirth which need not of
necessity have anything to do with so-called morals. Any changes apparent
in Potter were not due to his taking thought of moral considerations. The
only change of heart he had known was with respect to his country:
indifference had turned to devotion. The great alteration was that he had
acquired an object in life; everything else flowed out of that.
The nature of him was the same. There were the same dynamic possibilities,
the same urge to action, the same qualities which had formerly made for
unrest, recklessness, restlessness. His dynamo had been creating
electricity which must have outlet, and, none being provided, took what
freakish, ill-considered outlet it found. The same dynamo was still
generating, but its product flowed evenly, with stable force, along wires
placed to carry it. What had been turbulent potentialities were harnessed;
they had been harnessed by an idea, and that idea was that the needs of
his country demanded a certain service of him.
He went about his work not so much enthusiastically as grimly,
relentlessly. He was a man driven by an obsession; that obsession was to
clear the way against his country's call for aeroplanes. And Detroit came
to the conclusion that he was mad as a March hare. There were those of his
friends whose nature it was not to pronounce unpleasant words; these spoke
of him as eccentric.
One man, however, seemed to take Potter seriously, and his name was
Cantor. After his first call he came frequently to visit, making his
desire to cultivate Potter's friendship plainly apparent. Cantor was,
Potter judged, in the neighborhood of thirty-five; a man of wide
experience, whose eyes had seen most of the world with a distinctness
which enabled him to talk of it as no mere globe-trotter could talk. In
spite of a feeling, not so much of suspicion as of questioning, with which
Potter regarded Cantor at first, he found himself attracted by the man.
This was due, in its inception, doubtless to Cantor's attitude toward
Potter's object in life. There was no doubt that Cantor accepted Potter's
clearness of vision and was deeply interested in his plans. This, an oasis
of belief in a desert of skepticism, went far. Then the man had undoubted
charm. He was handsome; his manners were distinguished and wholesome,
though a trifle foreign; his brain was acute, active; his wit was a joy.
In short, he was an unsurpassed companion for a house-bound man. Potter
found himself liking Cantor more and more. He had never possessed a close
friend, a chum. It seemed as if Cantor were to be a successful aspirant to
that position.
But of all the events of that period the one which had, perhaps, most
significance was the return of Hildegarde von Essen. Potter was being, had
been, modified by a number of momentous happenings whose effects he was
able himself to see. Hildegarde was to modify him without his perceiving
it. And it may be asserted that her modification was the most profound,
far-reaching of all. It is the intent of Nature that the life of man shall
stretch over many years. A third of these years, say twenty-five, are used
up in bringing him to man's stature and in equipping him with mental tools
to carry on the trade of living. At the end of this period he stands
balanced in the doorway, ready to step out into the jostle. It is usually
at this moment that a woman intervenes. The most critical event of any
man's career is the advent of some woman. This point may be argued and
combated, but not successfully. It is critical because it is the major
point of departure in his journey. The character of this woman touches
every instant remaining in the man's life, either for good or ill. And it
is all a matter of chance! Here Nature does not plan. One might almost
accuse her of being sardonic. She shuts her eyes, shuffles together a
multitude of young men and young women, themselves blindfolded, and then
gives the word, "Choose your partners." Perhaps that is the fun Olympus
gets out of godship. It may be the whole thing is some Olympian gamble.
Upon this blind scramble depends the future of the race!
The marvel of it is that so many grasp possible partners.
Men are educated to choose a profession or business; they are educated to
enter a drawing-room; they are educated to choose a hat or a cravat. But
to choose a wife--that choice which is so paramount that one might almost
say it is the one choosing of his life, is not a choice of educated
reason, but is a blind snatch into a grab-bag. The worst of it is that he
cannot refuse to grab. Nature has seen to that. For the perpetuation of
the race she has given him sex, and sex may bless him or damn him, she
cares little which, so long as she produces another generation. It forces
him into the game.
Potter had news of Hildegarde's return from Hildegarde in person. He was
working in the old hangar--the one to which she had come looking like a
fairy prince on the day of their disastrous flight. It was now his
headquarters, enlarged to accommodate his needs. The building housed a
reasonably complete machine-shop, drafting-room, a combination technical
library, office, and study, as well as the rebuilt hydro-aeroplane for
which it had been constructed originally. Here Potter worked, and here his
world was content to leave him alone with his fad. Few visitors came, and
these found themselves unwelcome, for Potter was busy. He was designing a
motor that would be efficient to drive the battle-planes of his country to
victory.
He stood now coatless, eyes protected by a green shade, attention fixed
upon his drafting-table. He had not heard the stopping of a motor-car, nor
was his concentration interrupted by the unceremonious opening of the
door.
"What's the use pretending you don't know I'm here?" said Hildegarde.
Potter turned abruptly and found himself without words. He was not content
to extend one hand, but must stretch out both, ink-stained though they
were, and she took them boyishly.
"I just got home this morning," she said. "Dad said I couldn't come and
wouldn't send me any money, so I got a man to pawn some things and ran
away. I don't think the man gave me all the money he got--_quite_. Dad was
furious. He almost _busted_. As soon as he'd shouted himself into a state
of collapse and rushed out of the house I called your house on the
telephone. They said you were here, so I got in my car and came--and
aren't you going to say _anything_?"
"It's you," his lips said, stupidly enough, but his eyes must have been
more eloquent, for Hildegarde said, with satisfaction, "You _are_ glad to
see me."
He was thinking to himself that his memory was inefficient, for it had not
retained so many of the delights of her reality; it had forgotten the way
her little ears cuddled into her unruly hair; it had forgotten that
daring, challenging glint in her blue eyes; he had forgotten something of
that determined line of her brows--a determined line which did not give an
expression of severity. He had recalled her general appearance as one of
some pertness; it was not pertness, he saw, but keenness. She had seemed a
little girl--a rather naughty, wilful, impertinent little girl; that
seeming of youth was there, but it was no longer the youth of the little
girl with whom one _plays_ house--it was the youth of the girl on the
point of womanhood with whom one would desire to _keep_ house. She had
been alluring, intriguing, as he remembered her; in reality she was
enchanting, compelling, startling. She excited the imagination, not
physically, but adventurously. Potter had once compared her to a dancing
flame; he approved that comparison. The inevitable conclusion to be drawn
from studying Hildegarde was that life in her vicinity would be far from
uneventful. She was full of dynamic promise.
"I _am_ glad to see you," he said, letting her hands go with reluctance.
"I've been thinking about you."
"How nice! I've been thinking about you--wondering how you came out of it
... if your nose was flattened or one leg shorter than the other. Why, you
don't look as if you had been smashed all to pieces." She laughed gaily.
"I'll try to limp," he suggested, "if it will please you."
She drew her shoulders together and became serious. "I was afraid," she
said. "I couldn't bear to think you--were not the way you used to be. If
you had been crippled--and it was my fault! That's why I came so quickly.
I wanted to know. You see, I didn't know anything--except that you were
alive."
"On the whole, I think I benefited," he said.
She looked at him quickly, appraisingly. "Yes," she said, "you _have_
benefited. You look different, somehow, and better. There was something
about you before that made me feel uneasy--not exactly comfortable. Like a
panther in a cage." She laughed lightly at her simile. "You seemed to be
pacing up and down and glaring at the world. That is gone.... Yes, and
you've been behaving yourself, taking better care of yourself."
"Yes," he said. "My address is no longer the Pontchartrain bar--and I've
got a job."
"That satisfies you?" she said.
"Yes."
"Something happened. Something has made a great change in you. What was
it? I'm interested, you know."
"The thing that happened was the necessity for filling in several months'
time while I lay on my back. It was necessary to think quite a little."
"What did you think about?"
"The United States of America," he said, "mainly."
"I don't understand. Are you joking?"
"No," he said, so seriously that she knew he spoke of a momentous thing in
his life. "It was the result of the war, I suppose, and of little things
which derived from the war. The first thing I discovered was that I was a
sort of Nolan--a man without a country. Have you read that book?"
"Yes."
"I hadn't done what Nolan did. I'd just neglected my country utterly. I
hadn't bothered with it. Just before I was hurt a man asked me if I loved
my country, and that rather started things.... I don't go around talking
this sort of thing to everybody," he said with sudden reserve.
"Of course not."
"Have you ever thought much about it?"
"No--I think not. I've rather taken the country for granted, except when
Dad has bellowed about the fatherland and that sort of thing. Then I've
been stirred up a little. Irritated, I guess the word is. I haven't been
an out-and-out American, but I haven't been anything else. That's all....
Like father, for instance. His father was chased out of Germany in
'forty-eight, and you'd think Dad would have a grudge against it. But he
hasn't. He gets sentimental about Germany. He isn't an American at all,
though he was born here ... and that never seemed right to me."
Potter nodded. "He's not alone, of course, and it is a dangerous
condition.... Well, the thing that happened to me was that I learned
something about the United States, and the first thing I knew I was mighty
strong for it."
"And what are you doing here--with all these drawings and this machinery?"
"Aeroplanes," he said. "Maybe you can understand what I'm doing. Nobody
else seems to.... Doesn't it seem to you that we've _got_ to get into this
war?"
"I haven't thought much about that--not a great deal. But nobody seems to
want war."
"No. We're smug and satisfied and cocksure. But I think we will be forced
into it. We can't stand everything. And if we go in it will be a
tremendous thing--for which we won't be ready. We'll be in the position of
a man with a hand-saw who is suddenly compelled to cut down a forest.
We'll have to do everything after the thing comes--raise an army and equip
it. And we'll need aeroplanes by the thousands.... That's what I'm
doing--getting ready for the time when we need aeroplanes. That is, I'm
doing what I can to help."
"And you're not getting much help or sympathy," she said.
He smiled wryly. "But I'm going ahead, just the same. I hope we never need
them. Maybe we can stay out of it, and maybe we will stay out of it--but
I'm going to stick to this game until I know. Because," he said, with a
sudden lighting of the face, a glow of enthusiasm from his eyes, "it's the
best thing I can do for the country--and I want to do my best for it."
She touched his arm lightly and in her eyes was a glow caught from his
own. "It's fine," she said. "I think I understand. I'm going to understand
better. I guess I'll be an American, too."
There was a rap on the door, and Potter, thinking it was one of his
machinists, called to come in. Cantor entered, hesitated when he saw
Hildegarde.
"I beg your pardon," he said. "I didn't know you were engaged."
"Come in, Cantor.... This is Miss von Essen. You know her father, I
think."
"Yes, indeed," said Cantor, advancing, a graceful, forceful, pleasing
figure. "I didn't know Miss von Essen had returned." His eyes were fixed
upon her boldly, but not offensively--admiringly. "I have heard much of
Miss von Essen, and even saw her once at a distance. Since then I have
hoped it might be my privilege to be presented to her."
Even as he spoke he was studying her face intently. He turned a sharp
glance upon Potter, and apparently was satisfied. In spite of his
well-trained face and manner, he had been unable to conceal a trace of
embarrassment, of uneasiness. It had passed unnoticed by Potter.
Hildegarde had set it down to her unexpected presence.
"Cantor is about all the company I have here," Potter said.
"I shall come more frequently now if surprises like this are to be
expected."
Potter turned to Hildegarde. "It was no end good of you to come," he said,
"but really, you know, you shouldn't.... And you mustn't come again."
"I shall," she said, defiantly, "whenever I want to."
"I'll have to lock the door," Potter laughed. "You know what affection her
father has for me, Cantor."
"Indeed, yes.... But fathers don't learn everything."
Potter pressed his lips together, for this hint of something clandestine
in his relations with Hildegarde affronted him. He said nothing.
Then the door burst open and Herman von Essen rushed into the room,
bristling, panting. He stopped, glared at the little group, and pointed a
trembling finger at Hildegarde. "There you are.... I had you watched. I
knew you would come here.... It is like you, disgracing yourself. Have you
no brains? Rushing here to this man that has made your name common in the
whole city.... Out of here, out of here while I attend to him!" He
advanced threateningly, but Hildegarde did not move, only eyed him with
level contempt. "You," he raved at Potter, "you entice my daughter!... By
God! I'll show you!..." He advanced again, burly fists doubled,
Bismarck-like face purple and distorted by rage.
At the instant when it seemed the furious German would rush upon Potter,
Cantor took one step forward and spoke. His voice was incisive, cold,
compelling. It cut through von Essen's rage to his consciousness and
halted him. "Von Essen," said Cantor, "you forget yourself." That was all.
He stood very straight, heels together, shoulders squared--the attitude of
an officer facing his company.
Von Essen stopped, and his rage dropped from him as if it had been some
false face which could flutter to the ground. He was _compelled_. Cantor's
cool voice had a surprising, a powerful effect. "I--" he faltered, seeming
to grow smaller of stature, to wilt.
"You will take your daughter home," said Cantor, still in that cool,
commanding voice, "and you will treat her as a gentleman treats a lady. Am
I understood?"
Von Essen nodded. He was inarticulate.
"See to it," Cantor said. "Miss von Essen." He bowed to Hildegarde, and,
walking to the door, held it open for her, standing cold and straight
while she passed her father and came toward him.
Von Essen followed. He had the appearance of a man suddenly caved in.
Hildegarde paused in the door and turned. "I can't ask you to pardon him,"
she said. "I shall come again." Then she preceded her father through the
door.
Cantor closed it and smiled grimly. "You need have no anxiety over Miss
von Essen," he said.
Potter shook his head. "That gets me," he said. "How do you do it, Cantor?
In another minute I'd have had to thrash that old bounder.... I'm much
obliged for the miracle."
"He needs a little taking down," Cantor said, contemptuously. "These rich
German-Americans get too cocky sometimes. They have to be shown."
"I'd like to have your formula," said Potter.
Cantor changed the subject. "How's the motor coming?"
"Slowly."
"I haven't seen the drawings," Cantor suggested. "I'm interested, you
know."
"I'd like to show them to you," Potter replied, "but I'm not showing them
to anybody. I feel as if it were government work, you know. I'm sure
you'll understand."
"Perfectly. I shouldn't have suggested it.... Just dropped in to ask you
to come down to the club to dinner to-night."
"Thanks. I'll show up early. Want a game of handball and a shower? Take me
on?"
"You've been beating me too regularly, but I'll let you do it again. Maybe
La Mothe and O'Mera will be around."
Cantor walked out. As he got into his car he shrugged his shoulders and
smiled.