"St. Louis, Mo., March 10th.
"Darling Girl:
"I am taking for granted that you arrived safely. There has been no
word from you since you returned home a week since. I hope you
found the apartment in good shape and that things did not suffer
too much wear and tear at the hands of our late tenants.
"Just as I predicted, the folks were much disappointed at not
seeing you here. There was a regular family reunion. Grandma Murray
came on from Indianapolis and two of my paternal aunts all the way
from Kansas. As none of the relatives has ever seen Boy you may
imagine how disappointed they were. However, it couldn't be helped.
Naturally I did not tell them that you had been to Cincinnati. I
let them infer that you were not sufficiently recovered from the
effects of your recent operation to permit your making the trip. I
fully appreciate the state of your nerves and that a relapse was
inevitable; just the same I think you should write me and keep me
informed of your condition. Take it quietly for a few weeks and
you'll come out all right. Don't let that Cincinnati affair prey on
your mind: a little later when your health is better, you won't
take it so seriously. Now don't jump at the conclusion that I
don't appreciate the way you played up, or the narrow escape I have
had. You may feel sure that sort of thing will never happen again.
And that reminds me: I had a letter from Mr. F. saying he had
consulted his lawyer about taking action against the Club Window
and had been advised to let the matter drop. (_Requiescat in
pace!_) He wished to be remembered to you.
"The weather is depressing. I'm not feeling up to my standard. I
suspect I have been eating too much and exercising too little.
Well, Girlie, the train leaves in an hour and I have still some
odds and ends to look after. I enclose our route to follow Kansas
City. Now write me at once or I shall begin to worry about you. A
bunch of kisses to Boy from his Dad, reserving all you want for
yourself, of course.
"With all my love,
"Your devoted husband,
"WILL."
This letter was a week old. I had made several attempts to answer it but
all had ended in the waste-basket. Following my home-coming, I had been
glad to lie quietly in bed in obedience to the doctor's orders. A heavy
inertia lay upon me. My nights were an amorphous jumble of improbable
situations; I awoke of mornings with a nausea at heart. My mind was
furred with unpleasant memories. It revolved in circles. The more I
thought the faster it whirled, resulting in complete confusion. Inner
adjustment seemed impossible. I realized in a hazy way that I must
arouse myself or fall a prey to melancholia. Even Boy's laughter as it
was wafted to me from another room unleashed a thousand apprehensions.
The effulgence his being had shed into my life was now dimmed by fears
for his future. Should I be able to steer his craft, even launch it
safely, _preparedly_ on the turbulent sea of life? It was, probably, in
the very nature of things that I should exclude my husband from any
participation in my plans for the child. A fierce, almost a defiant,
sense of proprietary right began to assert itself in relation to our
son. The inertia gave way to a state of turbulence, which burned like a
consuming fever. To Will's numerous letters and enquiries I at last
responded by telegraph, "All well," I said.
One day there came a bulky envelope addressed in Will's handwriting. It
enclosed a letter from John Gailbraith, the sculptor, who was still in
Paris. Across the top Will had written: "This will interest you." Under
separate cover came a package of photographs, reproductions of the
colossal work he had recently completed for the Spring Exhibition at the
Salon.
"I have great hopes for this," he wrote. "(Hope is always
promise-crammed, isn't it?) You will see that I have called it
'Super-Creation.' It was conceived like a lightning flash but the
working out, the compelling cold, hard stone to express clearly
what I intended to convey is the result of a dogged grind of nearly
three years' incessant toil. Have I succeeded, do you think? Of
course you have not seen the original, but the photographs are
excellent work, having been taken at various angles and positions
and under my supervision. You will observe that the work is--well,
nothing short of monumental will express it. And, unless a
government or an institution is moved to buy it, I shall probably
have to build a house around it! However, I'm not discouraged
though I've gone in debt for years to come and mortgaged almost my
soul in order to get the wherewithal to complete the work. I
suppose this is what you call 'the artistic temperament.' But I
simply had to do it--I had to get it out of my system and in doing
so I feel that I have lived up to the best that was in me. After
all there is some consolation in the thought that one _has_ lived
up to one's best instincts. How goes your own work? And your
missus? Ask her to write me and tell me without circumlocution what
she thinks of my effort, especially the conception on the whole. I
should like to have discussed it with her and to have had her
opinion in the making. Over here one gets only the one-sided
opinion of one's confreres or the unimaginative view-point of a few
moneyed Americans who want names (_BIG TYPE_) to fill up the bare
wall-spaces.... I should like to ask your wife whether she is
pursuing her work in earnest or whether like so many lady
_dilettantes_ she is only amusing herself.... How I should like to
see you both here this coming summer! Is it not possible? I'll turn
over my menage to you if that is an inducement. Let me hear from
you soon and send me the latest picture of the son and heir.
"Yours fraternally,
"J. G."
I had thrilled at the mere suggestion of a trip abroad but relegated the
thought to a background of remote probabilities and gave myself up to an
eager contemplation of the photographic reproductions of the sculptor's
work. Following the numbers indicated on the back of each, I arranged
the photographs consecutively across the wall.
The form appeared to be a kind of spiral, each step or incline complete
in itself yet suggesting a connecting thread. At first glance I was
struck with the multiplicity of figures, all nearly life size. But as my
eagerness gave way to soberer perspective, something I had overlooked
now asserted itself: _In the score of characters represented there were
but two faces--that of one man and one woman!_ That is to say, the two
faces were reproduced ... yet ... or did one's fancy play at tricks?...
I applied the magnifying glass.... Yes, there were but two faces, both
repeatedly used by the artist, but with what wondrous and illuminating
difference! Starting from the left and lowest plane--symbolic of the
theme--there was embodied in the figures of the man and maid the lowest
form of love.... The youthful prettiness of the girl, the soft roundness
of her form, the maiden breast ... all these but accentuated the
undeveloped soul. Her very attitude, the abandon as she lay smiling,
half-hid amongst the leaves and blooms ... here, indeed, was "a parley
to provocation." ... Above her towered the figure of a man. In his
spare, sinewy form, conscient of its strength, vibrant with sex, the
young male was epitomized.... "Instinct" need not be carved across the
base.... Instinct, the first and lowest form of love.
From the grassy knoll the path ascended to a rocky promontory, bleak,
arid. Straining 'gainst the fury of the storm, the man and woman
climbed; his muscles tense, confusion limned upon his face; the woman,
crouching in her fright, hiding her face in her wind-tossed hair; while
underfoot they trampled on a mask, the leering mask of former self ...
and, riding on the wind, half cloud, half god, a phantom with veiled
face laid on the lash.... Confusion.... Chaos....
The path led on and up through thorny underbrush; a parched earth; the
cactus plant; some blanched bones, a horned toad. He stood apart with
sullen mien; his features thick and brutalized; his muscles lax and
loose, as if impotent rage had yielded to dumb apathy. The woman, lying
prone, distorted with revolt and fright, seeking to shut out from view
the hideous deformity at her breast--half man, half beast; its clenched
fists, contorted legs raised to rebel; the grotesque mask miming its own
despair. And in the background, poised on abyss-edge, a Hecate band
whirled in orgy-dance.... Where is the tutelary goddess now--the Better
Self, the Soul of Things? And even as I asked I followed in the path
which, still inclining, reached a broad plateau. In the foreground, the
man--gaunt and grim--the grimness of despair; his muscles knotted, his
horny hands, the poised axe. Through the matted woods a skulking
wolf.... Beyond, the woman; haggard of face, drawn with fatigue; no
longer full and round of form. Dropping seeds on fresh-tilled earth; a
living burden on her back; around her neck two chubby arms. And at the
entrance to the cave, half blended with the rocks, the Inscrutable One
stood guard.... "The Will to Live" was written here....
The path winds on, steeper, more tortuous still; by cliffs, abyss,
_impasse_, bald peaks, the Mount is reached ... and here they rest....
Like complements they stand, hand clasping hand, looking out and beyond;
serene of brow, though scarred with age. An august peace, the harvest
yield. A straight firm youth hangs on his mother's arm ... and in that
life is blent the best of both--the purpose of the race. The mantle of
the clouds half moulds a form; the hands reach forth to stroke their
eyes.... It is _the awakening_....