heiress to five million dollars!" cried Doctor Alvin, laying aside the
mask he had worn so long.
It was Susan's turn to be astonished. She looked at her guardian
fixedly, expressing pain in her look.
At length, in a low voice, she said:
"I do not see why."
"Susan!" began Doctor Alvin.
Then he hesitated, as if in doubt as to whether he should continue.
"I do not see why," repeated Susan, in the same low voice.
Doctor Alvin passed his hand over his forehead. He resumed:
"Susan, your father is coming back shortly. My guardianship is ended.
Your father made me swear on Julia's coffin, that I would discourage
in you all thoughts of marriage until he returned. He was afraid you
might follow in Julia's footsteps. I was to represent sentiment as
sentimentality, substitute art for love, and prevent your fancy
crystallizing into some man-inspired desire. I have kept my promise.
Your father will find you fancy-free, will he not?"
"Yes."
"But, Susan--" and Doctor Alvin's voice again expressed excitement.
"But--"
Doctor Alvin's voice trembled so that he was obliged to start over
again:
"Susan, you do not know what you are. You--you--are a beautiful woman.
You are more beautiful than Julia was at the height of her beauty. You
are more beautiful than your mother was--"
Doctor Alvin's voice echoed mournfully as if he were calling upon the
dead.
"Susan, you have only to look upon men to conquer them. You can
achieve with a gesture what artists accomplish with a masterpiece.
What can artists do, other than quicken the pulse of sluggard
humanity? But, Susan--God guide your power--you will make blood boil,
heads reel, hearts throb until they burst, if so you will it.
Art--artists! There is no need of you studying art. Artists will study
you. Have you never looked at yourself in the glass, child? Have you
never, when--when--You have studied art with Malepeste, and you know
what lines are. Have you never thought of studying your own lines?
None of the great statues or paintings, of which Malepeste has the
photographs, is so harmoniously perfect as you. Art!--You are the
genius of art. I have influenced you into taking up various lines of
work, that I might keep you from the pitfalls of love, until the
proper time. But, now, my guardianship is ended. I have played a part.
I must lay aside my mask. Susan, I have been deceiving you. Love is by
all odds the greatest thing in the world. You must love. And you must
let some one love you--some one of the many who will be ready to lay
down their lives for you--"
FOOTNOTES:
[62] Copyright, 1905, by Henry Holt and Company.
LUCY FURMAN
Miss Lucy Furman, short-story writer, was born at Henderson, Kentucky,
in 1870, the daughter of a physician. Her parents died when she was
quite young, and she was brought up by her aunt. Miss Furman attended
public and private schools at Henderson, and at the age of sixteen
years, graduated from Sayre Institute at Lexington, Kentucky. The
three years following her graduation were spent at Henderson and at
Shreveport, Louisiana, the home of her grandparents, in both of which
places she was a social leader. At the age of nineteen, it became
necessary for her to make her own way in the world, and for about four
years she was court stenographer at Evansville, Indiana. Miss Furman's
earliest literary work was done at Evansville. The first stories she
ever wrote were accepted by _The Century Magazine_ when she was but
twenty-three years of age. These were some of the _Stories of a
Sanctified Town_ (New York, 1896), one of the most charming books yet
written by a Kentucky woman. At the age of twenty-five, when her
prospects were exceedingly bright, Miss Furman's health failed
entirely, and during the next ten years she was an invalid, seeking
health in Florida, southern Texas, on the Jersey coast, and elsewhere,
but without much success, and being always too feeble to do any
writing. In 1907 she went up into the mountains of her native State to
become a teacher in the W. C. T. U. Settlement School at Hindman,
Knott county, Kentucky. She did very little at first, but gradually
her strength came back, and for the last two years she has been
writing stories and sketches of the Kentucky mountains for _The
Century Magazine_. In 1911 _The Century_ published a series of stories
under the title of _Mothering on Perilous_, which will be brought out
in book form. In 1912 Miss Furman had several stories in the same
magazine, one of the best of which was _Hard-Hearted Barbary Allen_.
Her lack of physical strength has compelled her to work very slowly,
and it is only by living out-of-doors at least half the time that she
can live at all. "I have charge of the gardening and outdoor work at
the Settlement School," Miss Furman wrote recently, "but the happiest
part of my life is my residence at the small boys' cottage, about
which I have told in the 'Perilous' stories, and in which I find
endless pleasure and entertainment. Here I hope to spend the
remainder of my days." Very pathetic, reader, and very heroic!
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Letters from Miss Furman to the Author; _The Century
Magazine_ (July, August, November, December, 1912).
A MOUNTAIN COQUETTE[63]
[From _Hard-Hearted Barbary Allen_ (_The Century Magazine_, March,
1912)]
Beneath the musket, on the "fire-board," lay a spindle-shaped, wooden
object, black with age. "A dulcimer," Aunt Polly Ann explained. "My
man made it, too, always-ago. Dulcimers used to be all the music there
was in this country, but banjos is coming in now."
Miss Loring knew that the dulcimer was an ancient musical instrument
very popular in England three centuries ago. She gazed upon the
interesting survival with reverence, and expressed a wish to hear it
played.
"Beldory she'll pick and sing for you gladly when she gets the dishes
done," promised Aunt Polly Ann. "Picking and singing is her strong
p'ints, and she knows any amount of song-ballads."
At last Beldora came out on the porch and seated herself on a low
stool near the loom. Laying the dulcimer across her knees, she began
striking the strings with two quills, using both shapely hands. The
music was weird, but attractive; the tune she played, minor,
long-drawn, and haunting. Miss Loring received the second shock of the
day when she caught the opening words of the song:
All in the merry month of May,
When the green buds they were swelling,
Young Jemmy Grove on his death-bed lay,
For the love of Barbary Allen.
Often had she read and heard of the old English ballad "Barbara
Allen"; never had she thought to encounter it in the flesh. As she
listened to the old song, long since forgotten by the rest of the
world, but here a warm household possession; as she gazed at Beldora,
so young, so fair against the background of ancient loom and gray log
wall, she felt as one may to whom the curtain of the past is for an
instant lifted, and a vision of dead-and-gone generations vouchsafed.
* * * * *
Beldora went off to fetch the nag, and Aunt Polly Ann accompanied the
guest to the horse-block, laying an anxious hand on her arm.
"You heared the song-ballad Beldory sung to you. She knows dozens, but
that's always her first pick. It's her favor_rite_, and why? Because
it's similar to her own manoeuvers. Light and cruel and leading poor
boys on to destruction is her joy and pastime, same as Barbary's. Did
you mind her eyes when she sung them words about
As she were walking through the streets,
She heard them death-bells knelling,
And every stroke it seemed to say,
"Hard-hearted Barbary Allen!"
like it was something to take pride in, instead of sorrow for? Yes,
woman, them words, 'Hard-hearted Barbary Allen,' is her living
description, and will be to the end of time."
Ten days later the shocking news reached the school that Robert and
Adriance Towles had fought on the summit of Devon Mountain for Beldora
Wyant's sake, and Robert had fallen dead, with five bullets in him,
Adriance being wounded, though not fatally. It was said that Beldora,
pressed to choose between the two, had told them she would marry the
best man; that thereupon, with their bosom friends, they had ridden to
the top of Devon, measured off paces, and fired. Adriance had fled, but
word came the next day that, weak from loss of blood, he had been
captured and was on the way to jail in the county-seat near the school.
In the weeks until court sat and the trial came off there was much
excitement. Sympathy for Adriance and blame for Beldora were
everywhere felt. Most of the county and all of the school-women
attended the trial, and interest was divided between the haggard,
harassed young face of Adriance and the calm, opulent loveliness of
Beldora. When she took the stand, people scarcely breathed. Yes, she
had told the Towles boys she would marry the best man of them. She had
had to tell them something,--they were pestering her to death,--and
the law didn't allow her to marry both. She had had no notion they
would be such fools as to try to kill each other. Miss Loring and the
other women watched anxiously for some sign of pity or remorse in her,
but there was not so much as a quiver of the lips or a tremor in her
voice. As she sat there in the lone splendor of her beauty, somewhat
scornfully enjoying the gaze of every eye in the court-room, one
phrase of her "favor_rite_" song rang ceaselessly through Miss
Loring's head--"Hard-hearted Barbary Allen." Her lack of feeling
intensified the sympathy for Adriance, and, to everybody's joy, the
light verdict of only one year in the penitentiary was brought in.
Half an hour later, Aunt Polly Ann, tragic in face and air, and with
Beldora on the nag behind her, drew rein before the settlement school.
"Women," she said with sad solemnity on entering, "for four year' you
have been bidding Beldory come and set down and partake of your feast
of learning and knowledge; for four year' she has spurned your invite.
At last she is minded to come. Here she is. Take her, and see what you
can accomplish on her. My raising of her has requited me naught but
tenfold tribulation. In vain have I watched and warned and denounced
and prophesied; her inordinate light-mindedness and perfidity has now
brung one pore boy to a' ontimely grave and another to Frankfort. Take
her, women, and see if you can learn her some little demeanor and
civility. Keep her under your beneficent and God-fearing roof, and
direct her mind off of her outward and on to her inward disabilities!
Women, I now wash my hands."
Receiving Beldora into the school was felt to be a somewhat hazardous
undertaking, but affection and sympathy for Aunt Polly Ann moved the
heads to do it. To the general surprise, Beldora settled down very
adaptably to the new life, being capable enough about the industries,
and passably so about books. But it was in music that she excelled.
Miss Loring gave her piano lessons, and rarely had teacher a more
gifted pupil.
Needless to say, when Beldora picked the dulcimer and sang
song-ballads at the Friday night parties, all the children and
grown-ups sat entranced. For three or four weeks, on these occasions,
she had the grace to choose other ballads than "Barbara Allen"; but
one night in early November, after singing "Turkish Lady" and "The
Brown Girl," she suddenly struck into the haunting melody and tragic
words of "Barbara Allen." A thrill and a shock went through all her
hearers. Miss Loring saw Howard Cleves start forward in his chair with
a look of horror, almost repulsion, on his fine, intelligent face.
Howard was the most remarkable boy in the school. Five years before,
when not quite fifteen, he had walked over, barefoot, from his home on
Millstone, forty miles distant, and presented himself to "the women"
with this plea: "I hear you women run a school where boys and girls
can work their way through. I am the workingest boy on Millstone, and
have hoed corn, cleared new-ground, and snaked logs since I turned my
fifth year. I have heard tell, over yander on Millstone, that there is
a sizable world outside these mountains, full of strange, foreign folk
and wonderly things. I crave to know about it. I can't set in darkness
any longer. My hunger for learning ha'nts me day and night, and burns
me like a fever. I'll pine to death if I don't get it. Women, give me
a chance. Hunt up the hardest job on your place, and watch me toss it
off."
They gave him the chance; and never had they done anything that more
richly rewarded them. Not only were his powers of work prodigious, but
his eager, brilliant mind opened amazingly day by day, progressing by
leaps and bounds. The women set their chief hopes upon Howard,
believing that in him they would give a great man to the nation.
Promise of a scholarship in the law school of a well-known university
had already been obtained for him, and in one more year, such was his
astonishing progress, he would be able to enter it, if all went well.
Miss Loring had observed that, in common with every other boy, big or
little, in the school, Howard had been at first much taken with
Beldora's looks, and it was with relief that she beheld his expression
of repulsion at Beldora's complacent singing of "Barbara Allen."
The first real warning came at the Thanksgiving party. During a game
of forfeits, Beldora was ordered to "claim the one you like the best."
Miss Loring saw her first approach Howard with a dazzling and tender
look in her splendid eyes, and even put out a hand to him; then
suddenly, with a wicked little smile, she turned and gave both hands
to Spalding Drake, a young man from the village. A deep flush sprang
to Howard's face, his jaws clenched, his eyes blazed tigerishly. It
might have been only chagrin at the public slight; still, it made Miss
Loring anxious enough to have a long talk with Beldora next day and
explain to her the hopes and plans for Howard's future and the tragedy
and cruelty of interfering with them in any way.
One morning, three days before Christmas, Beldora's bed had not been
slept in at all, and under the front door was a note in Howard's
handwriting, as follows:
DEAR FRIENDS:
Beldora told me last week she aimed to marry Spalding Drake Christmas.
Though he is a nice boy and I like him, I knew, if she did, I would
kill him on the spot. Rather than do this, it is better for me to
marry her myself beforehand. I have hired a nag, and we will ride to
Tazewell by moonlight for a license and preacher.
I know a man is a fool that throws away his future for a woman, that
Beldora is not worth it, and that I am doing what I will never cease
to regret. It is like death to me to know I will never accomplish the
things you set before me, and be the man you wanted me to be. I wish I
had never laid eyes on Beldora. I have agonized and battled and tried
to give her up; but she is too strong for me. I can fight no longer
with fate. It would be better if women like Beldora never was created.
She has cost the life of one boy, the liberty of another, and now my
future. But it had to be.
Respectfully yours,
HOWARD.
FOOTNOTE:
[63] Copyright, 1912, by the Century Company.
BERT FINCK
Edward Bertrand Finck ("Bert Finck"), prose pastelist and closet
dramatist, was born at Louisville, Kentucky, October 16, 1870, the son
of a German father and American mother. His parents were fond of
traveling and much of his earlier life was spent in various parts of
this country and abroad. He was educated in the private schools of his
native city, finishing his academic training at Professor M. B.
Allmond's institution. Mr. Finck began to write at an early age, and
he has published four books: _Pebbles_ (Louisville, 1898), a little
volume of epigrams; _Webs_ (Louisville, 1900), being reveries and
essays in miniature; _Plays_ (Louisville, 1902), a group of
allegorical dramas; and _Musings and Pastels_ (Louisville, 1905). All
of these small books are composed of poetic and philosophical prose,
many passages possessing great truth and beauty. In 1906 Mr. Finck was
admitted to the bar of Louisville, and he has since practiced there
with success. He seemingly took Blackstonian leave of letters some
years ago, but the gossips of literary Louisville have been telling,
of late, of a new book of prose pastels that he has recently finished
and will bring out in the late autumn of 1913.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Mr. Finck's letters to the Author; _Who's Who in
America_ (1912-1913).
BEHIND THE SCENES[64]
[From _Webs_ (Louisville, 1900)]
Could we but lift the countenance which pleases or repels, what seems
so sweet might thrust away, and what is repugnant charm or win our
sympathy and aid. Is not indifference often a net to catch or to
conceal? Modesty, diplomatic egotism? Wit, brilliant misery?
Contentment, wallowing despair? Langor, shrewd energy? Frivolity, woe
burlesquely masked by unselfishness or pride? Is not philosophy, at
times, resignation in delirium? The enthusiastic are ridiculed as
being self-conceited; the patient condemned for having no heart. We
stigmatize them as idle whose natures are toiling the noblest toil of
all, for not rarely do thought-gods drift through a spell of idleness;
a butterfly-fancy may breed a spirit that turns the way of an age's
career; there are sleeps that are awakenings; awakenings, sleeps; none
so worthless as many who are busy all the time. Smiles are sometimes
selfish triumphs; peace, the swine-heart's well-filled trough. Cheeks
rich with the fire of fever are envied as glow of health; steps, eager
to escape from a spectre, we laudingly call enthusiasm in work; and
the brain's desperate efforts to stifle bitter thoughts sharpen
tongues that fascinate with their brilliant gayety--the world dances
to the music of its sighs.
FOOTNOTE:
[64] Copyright, 1900, by the Author.
OLIVE TILFORD DARGAN
Mrs. Olive Tilford Dargan, poet and dramatist, was born at
Tilfordsville, near Leitchfield, Kentucky, in 1870. She attended the
public schools, in which her parents were teachers, until she was ten
years of age, when they left Kentucky and established a school at
Donophan, Missouri. Three years later she was ready for college, but her
mother's health broke, and the family settled in the Ozark Mountains,
near Warm Springs, Arkansas, where another school was conducted, this
time with the daughter as her father's assistant. For the following five
years she taught the young idea of backwoods Arkansas how to shoot; and
during these years she herself was always hoping and planning for a
college education, which hopes and plans seemed to crumble beneath her
feet when her mother died, in 1888, and she returned to Kentucky with
her invalid father. She had purposed in her heart, however, and finally
obtained a Peabody scholarship, which took her to the University of
Nashville, Tennessee, from which institution she was graduated two years
later. Miss Tilford then accepted a position to teach in Missouri, but
the climate so affected her health that she was forced to resign and
repair to Houston, Texas, to recuperate. She shortly afterwards took a
course in a business college and, for a brief period, held a position in
a bank. Teaching again called her and for two years she taught in the
schools of San Antonio, Texas. In 1894 Miss Tilford did work in English
and philosophy at Radcliffe College, Cambridge, Massachusetts; and a
year later she turned again to teaching, holding a position in Acadia
Seminary, Wolfville, Nova Scotia. This was followed by a year spent in
reading in the libraries of Boston, in which city she also worked as a
stenographer. Several of her articles were accepted by the magazines
about this time, which decided her to settle upon literature as her life
work. She worked too hard at the outset, however, her health gave way,
and she spent some months in the mountains of Georgia in order to regain
her strength. Miss Tilford was married, in 1898, to Mr. Pegram Dargan,
of Darlington, South Carolina, a Harvard man, whom she had met while at
Radcliffe. Not long after she went to New York, and there resumed her
literary labors with a high and serious purpose. Mrs. Dargan's first
volume of dramas, _Semiramis and Other Plays_, was published by
Brentano's in 1904, and taken over by the Scribner's in 1909. Besides
the title-play, _Semiramis_, founded on the life of the famous Persian
queen, this book contained _Carlotta_, a drama of Mexico in the days of
Maximilian, and _The Poet_, which is Edgar Allan Poe's life dramatized.
Mrs. Dargan's second volume of plays bore the attractive title of _Lords
and Lovers and Other Dramas_ (New York, 1906), the second edition of
which appeared in 1908. This also contains three plays, the second
being _The Shepherd_, with the setting in Russia, and the third, _The
Siege_, a Sicilian play, the scene of which is laid in Syracuse, three
hundred and fifty-six years before Christ. Mrs. Dargan's _Lords and
Lovers_, set against an English background, is generally regarded as the
best work she has done hitherto. Mr. Hamilton Wright Mabie has praised
this play highly, placing the author beside Percy MacKaye and Josephine
Preston Peabody Marks. Mrs. Dargan is Kentucky's foremost poetic
dramatist, and the work she has so far accomplished may be considered
but an earnest of what she will ultimately produce. Her beautiful
masque, _The Woods of Ida_, appeared in _The Century Magazine_ for
August, 1907, and it has taken its place with the finest English work in
that branch of the drama. She has had lyrics in _Scribner's_,
_McClure's_, _The Century_, and _The Atlantic Monthly_, her most recent
poem, "In the Blue Ridge," having appeared in _Scribner's_ for May,
1911. Mrs. Dargan's home is in Boston, but for the last three years she
has traveled abroad, spending much time in England, the background of
her greatest work. Her third and latest volume contains three dramas,
entitled _The Mortal Gods and Other Plays_ (New York, 1912). This was
awaited with impatience by her admirers on both sides of the Atlantic
and read with delight by them.
"Mrs. Dargan has so recently achieved fame that it may seem premature
to pronounce a critical judgment on her work," wrote Dr. George A.
Wauchope, professor of English in the University of South Carolina, in
claiming her for his State. "It is certain, however," he continued,
"that it marks the high tide of dramatic poetry in this country, and
is, indeed, not unworthy of comparison with all but the greatest in
English literature. One is equally impressed by the creative
inspiration and the mastery of technique displayed by the author. Each
of her plays reveals a dramatic power and a poetic beauty of thought
and diction that are surprising. The numerous songs, also, with which
her plays are interspersed, yield a rich and haunting melody that is
redolent of the charming Elizabethan lyrics. The dramas as a whole are
audacious in plot and vigorous in characterization. In the handling of
the blank verse, in the witty scenes of the sub-plots, in the splendor
of the phrasing, in the strong undercurrent of reflection, and, above
all, in their spiritual uplift and noble emotion, these dramas give
evidence of a remarkably gifted playwright who not only possesses a
deep feeling for art at its highest and best, but who also has command
of all the varied resources of dramatic expression."
It would be difficult for a critic to say more in praise of an author,
would it not?
BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The University of Virginia Magazine_ (January,
1909), containing Wm. Kavanaugh Doty's review of Mrs. Dargan's
_The Poet_; _Library of Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, 1909, v.
iii); _The Writers of South Carolina_, by G. A. Wauchope
(Columbia, S. C., 1910).
NEAR THE COTTAGE IN GREENOT WOODS[65]
[From _Lords and Lovers_ (New York, 1906)]
Act IV, Scene I. _Henry, with lute, singing._