WELL, such was my brother Paul and now he was here. Never before was he
so much my dear brother as now. So generally admirable was he that I
should have liked him quite as much had he been no relative. After a few
moments of explanation as to my present state I offered to share my room
with him for the period of his stay, but he declined. Then I offered to
take him to lunch, but he was too hurried or engaged. He agreed to come
to my room after the show, however, and offered me a box for myself and
my new friends. So much faith did I have in the good sense of Peter,
Dick and Rodenberger, their certainty of appreciating the charm of a man
like Paul, that I brought them to the theater this same night, although
I knew the show itself must be a mess. There was a scenic engine in this
show, with a heroine lying across the rails! My dear brother was a comic
switchman or engineer in this act, evoking roars of low-brow laughter by
his antics and jokes.
I shall never forget how my three friends took all this. Now that he was
actually here they were good enough to take him into their affectionate
consideration on my account, almost as though he belonged to them. He
was “Dreiser’s brother Paul,” even “Dear old Paul” afterwards. Because
working conditions favored us that night we all three descended on the
Havlin together, sitting in the box while the show was in progress but
spending all the intermissions in Paul’s dressingroom or on the back of
the stage. Having overcome his first surprise and possibly dislike of my
brash newspaper manner, he was now all smiles and plainly delighted with
my friends, Rodenberger and Peter, especially the latter, appealing to
him as characters not unlike himself, individuals whom he could
understand. And in later years, when I was in New York, he was always
asking after them and singing their praises. Dick also came in for a
share of his warm affection, but in a slower way. He thought Dick
amusing but queer, like a strange animal of some kind. On subsequent
tours which took him to St. Louis he was always in touch with these
three. Above all things, the waggish grotesqueries of McCord’s mind
moved him immensely. Peter’s incisive personality and daring
unconventionality seemed to fascinate Paul. “Wonderful boy, that,” he
used to say to me, almost as though he were confiding a deep secret.
“You’ll hear from him yet, mark my word. You can’t lose a kid like
that.” And time proved quite plainly that he was right.
During the play Paul sang one of his own compositions, _The Bowery_. It
was an exceptional comic song, quite destructive of the good name of the
Bowery forever, so much so that ten years later the merchants and
property owners of that famous thoroughfare petitioned to have the name
of the street changed, on the ground that the jibes involved in the song
had destroyed its character as an honest business street forever. So
much for the import of a silly ballad, and the passing song—writer. What
are the really powerful things in this world anyhow?
After the show we all adjourned to some scowsy music hall in the
vicinity of this old theater, which Dick insisted by reason of its very
wretchedness would amuse Paul, although I am sure it did not (he was
never a satirist). And thence to my room, where I had the man who
provided the midnight lunch for the workers at the _Globe_ spread a
small feast. I had no piano, but Paul sang, and Peter gave an imitation
of a street player who could manipulate at one and the same time a drum,
mouth-organ and accordion. We had to beat my good brother on the back to
keep him from choking.
But it was during a week of breakfasts together that the first
impressive conversations in regard to New York occurred, conversations
that finally imbued me with the feeling that I should never be quite
satisfied until I had reached there. Whether this was due to the fact
that I now told him about my present state and ambitions or dreams and
my somewhat remarkable success here, or that he was now coming to the
place where he was able to suggest ways and means and at the same time
indulge the somewhat paternalistic streak in himself, I do not know, but
during the week he persisted in the most florid descriptions of New York
and my duty to go there, its import to me intellectually and otherwise;
and finally he convinced me that I should never reach my true
intellectual stature unless I did. Other places might be very good, he
insisted, they all had their value, but there was only one place where
one might live in a keen and vigorous way, and that was New York. It was
_the_ city, the only cosmopolitan city, a wonder-world in itself. It was
great, wonderful, marvelous, the size, the color, the tang, the beauty.
He went on to explain that the West was narrow, slow, not really alive.
In New York one might always do, think and act more freely than anywhere
else. The air itself was tonic. All really ambitious people, people who
were destined to do or be anything, eventually drifted there—editors,
newspaper men, actors, playwrights, song-writers, musicians,
money-makers. He pointed to himself as a case in point, how he had
ventured there, a gawky stripling doing a monologue, and how one Harry
Minor, now of antique “Bowery Theater” fame, had seized on him, carried
him along and forwarded him in every way. Some one was certain to do as
much for me, for any one of ability. In passing, he now confided that
only recently, from having been the star song-writer for a well-known
New York music publisher (Willis Woodward), he had succeeded, with two
other men, in organizing a music publishing company in which he had a
third interest, and which was to publish his songs as well as those of
others and was pledged to pay him an honest royalty (a thing which he
insisted had not so far been done) as well as a full share as partner.
In addition, under the friendly urging of an ambitious manager, he was
now writing a play, to be known as “The Green Goods Man,” in which
within a year or two he would appear as star. Also he reminded me that
our sister E——, who had long since moved to New York (as early as 1885),
was now living in West Fifteenth Street, where she would be glad to
receive me. He was always in New York in the summer, living with this
sister. “Why not come down there next summer when I am there off the
road, and look it over?”
As he talked, New York came nearer than ever it had before, and I could
see the light of conviction and enthusiasm in his eye. It was plain, now
that he had seen me again, that he wanted me to succeed. My friends had
already sung my praises to him, although he himself could see that I was
fast emerging from my too shy youth. St. Louis might be well enough, and
Chicago—but New York! New York! One who had not seen it but who was
eager to see the world could not help but sniff and prick up his ears.
It was during this week that I gave the supper previously mentioned, and
took my fiancée to meet my brother. I am satisfied that she liked him,
or was rather amused by him, not understanding the least detail of his
life or the character of the stage, while the sole comment that I could
get out of him was that she was charming but that if he were in my place
he would not think of marrying yet—a statement which had more light
thrown on it years later by his persistent indifference to if not
dislike of her, although he was always too courteous and mindful of
others to express himself openly to me.... All of which is neither here
nor there.
My glorious supper turned out to be somewhat of a failure. Without
knowing it, I was trying to harmonize elements which would not mix, at
least not on such a short notice. The true Bohemianism and at the same
time exclusive camaraderie of such youths as Peter, Dick and
Rodenberger, and the rather stilted intellectual sufficiency of my
editorial friends and superiors of the _Republic_, and the utter
innocence and naïveté of Paul himself, proved too much. The dinner was
stilted, formal, boring. My dear brother was as barren of intellectual
interests as a child. No current problem such as might have interested
these editorial men had the smallest interest for him or had ever been
weighed by him. He could not discuss them, although I fancy if we had
turned to prize-fighters or baseball heroes or comic characters in
general he would have done well enough. Indeed his and their thoughts
were so far apart that they found him all but dull. On the other hand,
Peter, Dick and Rodenberger finding Paul delightful were not in the
least interested in the others, looking upon them as executives and of
no great import. Between these groups I was lost, not knowing how to
harmonize them. Struck all at once by the ridiculousness and futility of
my attempt, I could not talk gayly or naturally, and the more I tried to
bring things round the worse they became. Finally I was on pins and
needles, until the whole thing was saved by Wandell remembering early
that he had something to do at the office. Seizing their opportunity,
the managing editor and the dramatic editor went with him. The others
and I now attempted to rally, but it was too late. A half-hour later we
broke up, and I accompanied my brother to his hotel door. He made none
but pleasant comments, but it was all such a fizzle that I could have
wept.
By Sunday morning he was gone again, and then my life settled into its
old routine, apparently—only it did not. Now more than ever I felt
myself to be a flitting figure in this interesting but humdrum local
world, comfortable enough perhaps but with no significant future for me.
The idea of New York as a great and glowing center had taken root.
Some other things tended to move me from St. Louis. Only recently
Michaelson, who had come to St. Louis to obtain my aid in securing a
place, had been harping on the advantage of being a country editor, the
ease of the life, its security. He was out of work and eager to leave
the city. I think he was convinced that I was financially in a position
to buy a half interest in some fairly successful country paper (which I
was not), while he took the other half interest on time. Anyway I had
been thinking of this as a way of getting out of the horrible grind of
newspaperdom; only this mood of my brother seemed to reach down to the
very depths of my being, depths hitherto not plumbed by anything, and
put New York before me as a kind of ultimate certainty. I must go there
at some time or other! meanwhile it might be a good thing for me to run
a country paper. It might make me some money, give me station and
confidence....
At the same time, in the face of my growing estimate of myself, backed
by the plaudits of such men as Peter and Dick (who were receiving twice
my salary), to say nothing of the assurance of my brother that I had
that mysterious thing, personality, I was always cramped for cash, and
there was no sign on the part of my employers that I would ever be worth
very much more to them. Toward the very last, as I have said, they
changed, but then it was too late. I might write and write, page
specials every week, assignments of all kinds, theatrical and sport
reviews at times—and still, after all the evidence that I could be of
exceptional service to them, twenty-two or -three dollars was all I
could get. And dogging my heels was Michaelson, a cheerful, comforting
soul in the main, but a burden. It has always been a matter of great
interest to me to observe how certain types, parasites, barnacles,
decide that they are to be aided or strengthened by another, and without
a “by-your-leave” or any other form or courtesy to “edge in,” bring
their trunk, and make themselves at home. Although I never really liked
Michaelson very much, here he was, idling about, worrying about a job or
his future, living in my room toward the last, eating his meals (at
least his breakfasts) with me, and talking about the country, the charm,
ease and profit of editing a country newspaper!
Now, of all the people in this dusty world, I can imagine no one less
fitted than myself, temperamentally or in any other way, to edit a
country paper. The intellectual limitations of such a world! My own
errant disposition and ideas, my contempt for and revolt against the
standardized and clock-work motions and notions of the average man and
woman! In six months I should have been arrested or drummed out by the
preacher, the elders, and all the other worthies for miles around. Let
sleeping dogs lie. The louder all conventionalists snore the better—for
me anyhow.
But here I was listening to Michaelson’s silly drivel and wondering if a
country newspaper might not offer an escape from the humdrum and
clamlike existence into which I seemed to have fallen. From December on
this cheerful mediocrity, of about the warmth and intelligence of a
bright collie, was telling me daily how wonderful I was and that I
“ought to get out of here and into something which would really profit
me and get me somewhere”—into the editorship of a country weekly!
What jocular fates trifled with my sense of the reasonable or the
ridiculous at this time I do not know, but I was interested—largely, I
presume, because I was too wandering and nebulous to think of anything
else to do. This cheerful soul finally ended by indicating a paper—the
Weekly Something of Grand Rapids, Ohio (not Michigan), near his father’s
farm (see pp. 247-255, _A Hoosier Holiday_), which, according to him,
was just the thing and should offer a complete solution for all our
material and social aspirations in this world. By way of this paper, or
some other of its kind, one might rise to any height, political or
social, state or national. I might become a state assemblyman from my
county, a senator, a congressman, or United States senator! When you
owned a country paper you were an independent person (imagine the editor
of a country paper being independent of the conventions of his
community!), not a poor harried scribe on a city paper, uncertain from
week to week whether you were to be retained any longer. There were the
delights of a country life, the sweet simplicity of a country town, away
from the noise and streets and gaudy, shabby nothingness of a great
city. ... As I listened to the picture of his native town, his father’s
farm, the cows, pigs, chickens, how we could go there and live for a
while, my imagination mounted to a heaven of unadulterated success,
peace, joy. In my mind I had already rented or bought a small vine-clad
cottage in Grand Rapids, Ohio, where, according to Michaelson, was a
wonderful sparkling rapids to be seen glimmering in the moonlight, a
railroad which went into Toledo within an hour, fertile farmland all
about, both gas and oil recently struck, making the farmers prosperous
and therefore in the mood for a first-class newspaper such as we would
edit. Imagine sparkling rapids glimmering in the moonlight listed as a
financial asset of a country paper!
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