MAN TO MAN
As Barnes hurried through the little Dutch door on his way to see
Langdon, he felt like an exchanged prisoner going to rejoin his colors.
He was conscious of one big emotion--that of freedom. However slight
the chances, so long as a man may fight, victory is at least within his
grasp. Yet Barnes was neither confident nor even sanguine. His thoughts
did not go so far as to speculate upon the result. It was enough that
he need no longer remain passive.
His plan was simple. He would tell Langdon the whole story and claim
the rights of which he had been deprived. He would claim the privilege
of ignoring the engagement which had not yet been publicly announced,
which had not as yet even been announced to her father, so far as it
might restrict him in any honorable approach to the girl. He would make
Langdon see that he did not do this presumptuously, but simply on the
ground that he was entitled to fight for his pictures as Langdon fought
for his symphonies. Eleanor would, of course, remain in ignorance
of the agreement. She was unrestrained by any code and so could then
choose, if at all, as her heart dictated.
Barnes found Langdon dressed and sitting in the sun before the house
with his arm in a sling. He had lost both weight and color. He greeted
Barnes with what seemed like a genuine welcome.
“I guess we’re all glad to see you back, Joe,” he said earnestly.
“They’ve been devilish uneasy up at the other house without you.”
“I don’t wonder,” answered Barnes. “Some devilish queer things have
been happening up there during these last few weeks.”
Carl glanced up quickly.
“What do you mean?” he demanded.
Barnes sat down on the turf a little way from Langdon and stared at the
saffron road. The tawny ribbon seemed such an integral part of all the
strange occurrences of this last month that he turned to it now, as to
a comrade, for help in explaining.
“In some ways,” he began, “because you’re an artist it makes it easier
to tell you; but in other ways that fact makes it harder.”
Langdon leaned forward anxiously.
“What’s the trouble?” he demanded. “Is anything wrong--up there?”
“I don’t know about that,” answered Barnes, “but something is wrong
right here.”
“With you, Joe?”
“With you and me,” answered Barnes.
Langdon paused for a moment, and then, through half-closed lips, he
groaned, “Yes, something is wrong with me. But how did you know?”
Barnes lifted his eyes and studied the strained white face of the
other. It was his turn to be surprised. He glanced at the bandaged arm.
Langdon shook his head.
“No,” he answered, “it isn’t that.”
“Then--”
“It’s your sister, Joe,” explained Langdon. “There’s something about
her I don’t understand. She hasn’t been herself since you left.”
Barnes interrupted him.
“Don’t tell me any more,” he commanded.
“I’ve been waiting for this chance to talk it over with you, Joe.”
“I haven’t any right to listen,” Barnes hurried on. “But I have
something to say to you--that--that may help you out. Only I don’t know
just how to begin. I want you to understand, in the first place, that
we’ve all been as square as we knew how--that what has happened has
been, in a way, inevitable.”
Langdon sat as fixed as a marble statue. Barnes turned his eyes back to
the saffron road.
“You see,” he began, “it all came about by chance. I was walking along
this road when I found her by the letter-box, crying.”
“Found who?” demanded Langdon.
“Eleanor. She had just received a letter from her brother, saying he
wouldn’t come home.”
Langdon looked dazed.
“From her brother?”
“From Joe. You see I’m not her brother at all.”
Langdon rose slowly from his chair. Barnes too rose. He forgot for
the moment his own rights in this matter. He felt as though he were
confessing to an imposition. It occurred to him that this was just the
way that Aunt Philomela must have first looked upon the plan.
“Then who the devil are you?” demanded Langdon, aggressively.
“No relation to the family at all,” answered Barnes. “To you--just a
fellow artist.”
Langdon turned his eyes towards the brick house. He repeated almost
automatically,
“No relation at all. Just a fellow artist.”
“And Joe himself,” ran on Barnes, “is up there now. He came back
to-day.”
Langdon tottered. Barnes seized his arm.
“Sit down, old man,” he urged.
But Langdon shook himself free and stepping back a pace stared like a
man at bay. The attitude helped Barnes to justify himself again. They
stood now man to man.
“Langdon,” said Barnes, quietly, “the position was easier for you than
it was for me. I was forced to listen--”
“You might have saved me from confiding in you,” broke in Langdon
through half-closed lips.
“Saved you?” answered Barnes. “Don’t you think I would have saved
myself that, if it had been possible?”
“It must have seemed like a good joke to you,” said Langdon.
Barnes caught his breath.
“No,” he answered slowly, “it wasn’t much of a joke.”
He hesitated and then went on,
“Perhaps when I’m done, you can see just how much of a joke it was.”
Langdon stepped forward.
“You don’t mean--”
Barnes nodded.
“Exactly,” he answered. “I mean that all the time I have felt the same
towards Eleanor that you do. I mean that I have been fighting for my
pictures just as you have been fighting for your symphonies. The
difference is that--until Joe came back--I have had to fight myself,
too. I have had to stand back helpless and look on.”
“And now?” demanded Langdon.
Barnes took a long breath. He met Langdon’s hot eyes steadily.
“And now,” he said, “I’ve come to claim my rights.”
“What are they?” inquired Langdon.
“The privilege of making my love known to her--the privilege of winning
her if I can. The privilege,” he added slowly, “of putting that sunrise
we looked at together into colors as you would put it into music.”
For a moment Langdon stared at him in silence. Then he groped for his
chair. He sat leaning forward with his forehead in his hand. When he
finally looked up, his face was set.
“Yes,” he agreed. “I think you have that right.”
“That and nothing more,” replied Barnes. “I don’t want you to think
that Eleanor herself has--has given me any encouragement in this.”
“Not even--since you’ve come back?”
“I’ve not had time to exchange a half dozen words with her since then.”
Langdon relapsed into silence and Barnes hurried on. He was very
anxious to make himself clearly understood. He didn’t want Langdon to
think he was taking an unfair advantage.
“Langdon,” he said, “I’m afraid I’m not chivalrous enough to wish you
success. It’s too serious a business for both of us. But I can say
frankly that I want the girl to choose for her own happiness. And I
don’t see a pennyworth of difference between us. We are both artists;
we are both honest; we have both, I should say, about the same amount
of talent whatever that may count; we offer her about the same things.
We’d both buckle down to make her happy for all there is in us.”
“I don’t think women choose for those things,” answered Langdon, dully.
“Nor I neither,” agreed Barnes. “I don’t know how they choose. Perhaps
they don’t choose at all. We hold out the straws and they draw. All is
I want to put my straw in with yours, Langdon. I want a chance--because
of all it means to me and my pictures.”
Langdon rose wearily.
“There isn’t much use discussing it,” he said. “You’re right--devilish
right.”
Barnes hesitated about offering his hand.
“We can’t go ahead exactly as friends,” he faltered, “but we needn’t be
enemies, need we?”
“No,” answered Langdon. “But I don’t think anything we ourselves may do
consciously will play a very important part in the affair.”
“Nor I either. So here’s my hand to a fellow artist anyway.”
Langdon took it.
“I’ll see you off and on during the next few weeks I suppose,” said
Barnes, “but there’s no need of ever bringing this up again.”
Langdon straightened himself.
“I didn’t get your name,” he observed with something of a smile.
“Barnes.”
“Mr. Barnes, I ought to tell you that whatever formal engagement
existed between Miss Van Patten and myself has already been canceled.”
“Good Lord,” exploded Barnes. “You mean--”
“That we found we had been over hasty. That is all. There has been
no--misunderstanding.”
“But you--”
“I still mean to make her my wife if she concludes it is for her
happiness. This new development may help her to decide.”
“Why that’s great,” exclaimed Barnes. “Then we’re both back on our
mark.”
“Yes,” answered Langdon, grimly. “And I’m going in now to telephone
her.”
“And I,” concluded Barnes. “I guess I’ll go back to the house.”
“Good-day, Barnes.”
“Good-day, Langdon,” answered Barnes.
And turning abruptly Barnes swung off down the road at as fast a pace
as he could make.