Years passed by, but brought no tidings from Jack Felden. I made no
inquiries for him; his last request came to me as from the grave and
was sacred. Had we met on the street, I would have passed him
unheeded, unless the first advance had come from him.
I said no tidings came from him; that is, no direct or positive
tidings.
On the first of May following his letter, a case of Chateau Lafitte, a
jasmine turkish pipe and six sealed cans of _Ladikiyeh_ tobacco
came to my room. Tacked to the box was an envelope containing this
message: "On the first day of May and November of every year, drink to
the health of a lost friend who loved you. May the cares of life lift
from your heart as lightly as the smoke curls from your chibouque."
Regularly after that, on November 1st and May 1st, a case of finest
claret and a half dozen cans of Turkish tobacco sent from a great wine
house in New York, was placed in my room by an express messenger, and
never after that did I fail to drink in silence to my friend. Whoever
sent the wine and tobacco evidently kept note of my life, for my
residence was changed three times, once to a distant city; the
messenger found me wherever I was domiciled.
Not long after Felden's disappearance, the troubles which had been
brewing between the North and the South broke out into open war. Our
house was among the first to close its business as it was wholly
dependent on Southern trade. We paid up every dollar we owed and both
heads of the firm retired to the country. Service was offered me under
another firm, but as I had become a part of the machinery of the old
house, I felt such a change would prove uncongenial.
I volunteered in answer to Mr. Lincoln's first call for troops and was
sent into camp in Kentucky. In a month I was sick and ordered
discharged by the surgeon. A complaint, hitherto unknown to me,
forbade active and hard work, but the consolation was offered me that
with light, healthful exercise, generous food and abstinence from any
nervous strain, I might live to old age. I was given a clerkship in
the commissary department, and in '62 was transferred to Washington
city. When the war was over I was retained in my position. Close
confinement affected my health.
One of my pleasantest memories was of a summer spent in fishing and
boating in the neighborhood of Mackinaw. Something impelled me to
renew my old friendship with the well-remembered scenes. After a brief
stay on the island I became a denizen of a lumber camp located a few
miles from the rock which brought me to your acquaintance. Alone in a
light row-boat which I had purchased at Buffalo on my way up the
lakes, a large part of each day was spent on the water.
One bright day I anchored my boat near the "Rock" I mentioned to you,
on the boat coming from the Soo, and wandered in the woods stretching
behind it. The forest was of small trees, with here and there an old
timer spared by the loggers. Every thing about me was wild, and
excepting stumps and upper members of trees from which saw-logs had
been removed, there was nothing to indicate fellowship with men.
Emerging from a small ravine I came upon an opening in the wood on the
edge of which was a cluster of three tents, one apparently for the
occupancy of a luxurious owner; a plainer one for servant or servants
and a third for a kitchen with a stove pipe projecting through its
apex. In front of the principal tent was a sort of porch or shed
covered with light boards to keep out the rain, and over-topped with
boughs giving it a sylvan character.
I walked toward the tent when a huge old mastiff, fat and unwieldily,
sprang toward me with a bark and growl which brought me to a sudden
halt. The beast rushed toward me angrily, but all at once paused and
smelt about me with his bristles erect. These, however soon smoothed
down and the dog whined as if I was not unknown to him. A gentleman
and lady stepped from the large tent. Imagine my intense surprise when
I recognized before me the stately form of Jack Felden. I repressed
all evidences of recognition and with a bow and low apology was about
to turn away, when Jack in his old cheery tone, cried out:
"Don't go, Paul, chance has brought you to me; why old Akbar
recognized you and wishes you to stop; come back!" His words were
kindly and his tone almost loving. I ran to him and for a moment our
arms were about each others shoulders and our eyes were moistened by
tears. The lady came forward, saying:
"It is Mr. Jamison, Jack, is it not? But I need not ask, for no man,
but you Mr. Jamison, would be thus met by my husband."
We were soon seated before that tent in that sweet intercourse which
arises only between genuine friends. It was difficult to realize that
years had elapsed since I had last seen Jack. He was the same open
hearted, genial and dignified man. Shortly afterward, the dog got up
lazily, and trotting toward the little ravine, met a gray bearded
negro--the Jim Madison who so disturbed me on the Licking river. His
pleasure at seeing me seated with Felden and his wife, seemed
unbounded. When I repeated to him what I had told his master of my
location in the logging camp, he said, in a tone that showed the thing
was a matter of course:
"Well! Mars Jack, I'll jes' take de boat an' go to de camp an' fotch
Mr. Jamison's things over."
Jack laughed, "Yes, Jim, your hospitality has only run ahead of mine.
Jamison must come and make his home with us in 'Big Rock Camp.'"
Before night I was in possession of Jim's tent and he had fixed his
cot in a corner of the kitchen. We spent the next few days fishing,
walking and talking. The late afternoons and evenings were delightful.
Jack sang gloriously to the guitar, and his wife could discourse
charming music from that most inharmonious of instruments, the banjo.
She had a rich contralto voice and sang with what is higher than all
art--exquisite tenderness and deep feeling.
Jack was usually as gay as I had ever known him, but occasionally his
face had a tinge of intense sadness, which he evidently struggled to
suppress. This expression was never shown in his wife's sight. With
her he was a rolicking, joyous man, and every act and word showed him
a loving, an idolatrous husband. But when her back was turned he
occasionally regarded her with a look of such pain that my heart went
out toward him and ached for him.
About a week after my arrival Jack and I were fishing at some distance
from the camp, our low conversation had flagged, when he suddenly
said: "Mr. Jamison, you must have thought me a brute all of these
years."
I quickly responded, "No, Jack! I never doubted you had good reasons
for your silence, and nothing would have tempted me here had I dreamed
I would meet you."
"I am so glad you came! I have wanted to see you more than you can
think." His voice was exquisitely modulated while saying this.
"I wish now to tell you every thing. Rita wishes me to do so. Your
great discretion will teach you how far you must hereafter be reticent
in her presence. The one great object of my life is to save her
pain--to make her happy."
"When I wrote you my long letter I was about to be married and was to
call to see you on our way to Boston; am I not right?" I nodded.
"Well, in a week Rita received a letter from her sister saying she was
not well, and suggesting that it would be better we should be married
in Tennessee. This letter altered our plans. A few days later a
dispatch came from Wilton, telling us, that poor Minnie had died
suddenly, she and her baby at the same time. Mrs. Allen was a great
stickler for what she called the proprieties of life, and though she
had not in her heart a spark of affection for her nieces, she insisted
our marriage should be postponed for at least three months.
Rita had been in her care since childhood; it is true the care was of
no gentle kind, but she was grateful and did not wish to displease her
Aunt. I went to Chicago to get my affairs into shape. Before the time
I was to have returned, my darling wrote me that her shrewd
worldly-wise Aunt had become suddenly alarmed by the shape political
matters were rapidly taking; had determined to convert all she owned
into money and to go to her relatives in England for the remainder of
her days. The dear girl begged me to come to her as soon as possible.
Her wish was my law. I started the next day; for I had acquired the
habit of being always ready for a change of base.
Reaching ---- I found the shrewish old woman up to her eyes in
affairs. I lent her all the assistance possible, and in one month she
was ready for her departure. With her and another for witnesses, Rita
and I were made one. She dowered her niece with five thousand dollars,
kissing her most decorously on the forehead. In a half hour after the
ceremony she started north, and we west. Her last words were, "Adieu!
Don't write to me. If I ever care to hear from you I will write." She
thus passed out of our lives and we know not whether she be alive or
dead.
My bride and I went to Memphis and thence to St. Louis. We were
absolutely happy. The world was bright and rosy to us both. My wife
was, as fully as I, imbued with the belief that we were mated,
dovetailed together; were as thoroughly one as Adam or Shiva were one,
before Eve or Parvati were taken from them.
Possessed as we were of perfect health, physically we might have been
models to an artist for robust, untainted manhood and womanhood. Not a
cloud flecked our sky--not a shadow, we thought, could possibly lurk
beneath the horizon. At St. Louis, the day after our arrival, we had
been out for a walk and on returning I went to the hotel reading room,
while Rita gaily tripped up stairs toward our room, kissing her hand
to me from the upper landing. I picked up a paper, chance-dropped by
some traveller, published in the town near my home; the same which Jim
had brought me with the announcement of Belle's marriage. Almost the
first thing I saw was an editorial statement that "the marriage
between the beautiful Mrs. Belle ---- and the Marquis of ---- in Rome
had been positively and permanently abandoned." My eyes were riveted
to the horrible column. It continued: "The proud uncrowned Queen of
---- discovered before it was too late, the titled groom desired the
gems and gold in the bride's strong box, far more than the jewels and
pure metal so effulgently shining in her form and rich in her
character, etc., etc." I was stunned--my blood stood still in my
heart. I leaned over upon a table and was blind from intense agony. I
thought of my own misery, but Great God! what would become of my poor
wife! My limbs seemed powerless; I did not move until a light hand
rested upon my head.
My wife had come down to find me. "Oh, darling, what is it, what is
it?" I took her hand and slowly staggered to our room. I knelt at her
feet. I prayed her to forgive me. I hid my face in her lap and sobbed
as a broken hearted child. She smoothed my hair and for some minutes
with sweetest of all sympathy let my grief flow. Then she lifted my
head.
"Tell me what it is, my husband."
I looked into her dear pale face and cried, "I cannot--I cannot break
your heart, my poor wife."
"Break my heart, darling! It can never break while it has yours to
dwell in."
"But," I gasped, "we must part."
"Part! part! Oh, God! Jack! what is it you say? part! no, no! Never,
never!" She was as colorless as the lace about her neck. I then told
her all.
When I had finished, she laid her arm around my neck, drew my cheek to
hers, and said in a firm, brave voice, "No, Jack, my darling, we will
not part. I am your wife, wedded in Heaven. God was witness to our
betrothal under the open sky. God was sponsor to our marriage. We are
man and wife and no man or woman can ever separate us. I am your Eve
darling and with you would live in Eden, but if driven out, I will be
by your side and wherever we go, there will be my paradise. You have
not offended the law. You thought yourself free and no one can blame
you."
I pressed her to my heart and cried, "My Rita, my noble Rita!"
"No, no! Jack, I am your Rita, but not your noble Rita. I am simply a
woman; I am your wife and do no more or no less than any loving woman
should do."
We resolved to go to Chicago, to live in seclusion while I should do
all I could to increase my fortune, and then we would go off to some
far off land, where there could be no possibility of having scandal's
finger pointed at us. I then wrote you to forget me.
I again became Jack Felden, and my wife learned to like my olive hue
and my dark hair better than my natural complexion. Chicago became our
home. I courted fortune on change. For a while I was but indifferently
successful. One year on almost the last day of August, Jim hurriedly
entered my office saying:
"Mars Jack, your time is come. My ole ankles tells me thar will be a
killing frost dis night; the corn will be cotched. I knows what I
tells you. I run all way down town to tell you. Go out now, dis very
minit, an' buy all de corn you can carry; put your las' dollar up and
make a fortune. You'll win, Mars Jack; if you fails, you kin sell me
for a ole grinnin possum."
The honest face of my old friend was ashy from excitement. With one
word--"Jim I'll do it," I went on the board and before night nearly
every dollar I owned on earth was up in margins on corn. That night
there was a frost, corn went up several cents; this gave me additional
margins, and I risked all. One month later I had cleared a handsome
fortune.
The next year Rita and I went abroad to remain for two years. A boy
was born to us in Egypt. We wanted Jim and Dinah to see him. For
though they were our servants, we loved them as our best friends. I
knew how Dinah would yearn to hold little Jack on her bosom; to live
over in her deep loving fancy the days when her baby John drew his
life from her breast. She had prayed that Miss Rita would let her nuss
Mars John's Baby. She never saw him. In London he was exhaled as a dew
drop. It was a sad blow; but my wife did not grieve as I feared she
would.
She said "it is best Jack. He would have been nameless in the eyes of
the law. We will live for each other." It would have been better had
she shed more tears; for there are times when her very fortitude
alarms me.
We returned to Chicago. Rita was quietly happy in her little secluded
home. I am always happy, when her face is unclouded.
My disguise as Jack Felden precludes any ambition either social or
otherwise. Our little family lives for each other, and is perfectly
satisfied to know only a few necessary acquaintances. We go to
theatres and concerts and keep ourselves abreast of progress and of
life. We are school teachers, Jim being our pupil. His life is inwoven
with ours. We are both fond of books. People we often meet at places
of amusement and on our drives look at us inquiringly, and
occasionally some have tried to break into our seclusion. We have met
the kindly advances courteously, but continue to live within
ourselves. Our city being made up of people new to each other, makes
this easy.
Once in New York at the opera I saw Belle; she was the admired
occupant of a box. Her opera glass was bent upon us several times. I
think she recognized her acquaintance of the New Orleans ball-room.
She was still queenly, cold, and I could see selfishness had laid its
mark upon more than one of her perfectly modeled features. She was
still the proud rich widow.
Rita looked at her through her glass, and said to me "Jack dear, look
at that magnificent blonde; she is perfect in form, and her features
are faultless, but she could never be a follower of the Buddha; she
could tread the life out of living beings, and care not if she only
did not soil her skirts." With that she turned so as not to see her
again. I kept my counsels. Belle was not again referred to.
Last spring Rita lost a little girl at its birth; she did not
recuperate. The Doctor advised a tent life for the summer. Dinah was
not well enough to accompany us. If Rita be not fully recovered by the
middle of autumn, we will go to the upper Nile. I have an idea its
climate must prove beneficial to her.
As I said, we keep to ourselves; at first, feeling it necessary
because we were over a social volcano, but lately from choice. I
cannot help thinking that Belle will some day grow weary of her
widowed life and will make me free; she can get a decree of divorce, I
cannot. I would not commit a fraud to win one, and she would not
permit me to obtain it otherwise. Now Jamison, you know why I have so
long neglected you."
"Yes, Jack, I not only know, but fully appreciate your feelings, and
though I try to be a religious man, I cannot blame you for your
course." With that he pressed my hand in warm and grateful affection.
Felden seemed to have told all he wished to tell at that time. That
there was something still untold, I suspected.