Produced by Al Haines.
[Illustration: Cover]
[Illustration: I despise your threats," she said choking with her own
words. "I despise you."]
ROBERT
KIMBERLY
BY
FRANK H. SPEARMAN
ILLUSTRATED BY
JAMES MONTGOMERY FLAGG
TORONTO
McLEOD & ALLEN
PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT, 1911, BY
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
Published February, 1911
TO MY WIFE
ILLUSTRATIONS
I despise your threats," she said choking with her own words. "I
despise you." . . . . . . _Frontispiece_
Kimberly placed it without hesitation on her shoulders
She sang for him "Caro Mio Ben"
An acolyte, entering in the gray of the early morning, saw on the last
of the kneeling benches a man resting with bowed head
Robert Kimberly
CHAPTER I
The dancing pavilion, separated from the Casino itself by an arched
passageway and affording another pretty view of the lake in the
moonlight, was filled with young people when Alice entered.
"It will be cool here, I think," suggested Dolly De Castro, leading the
way for her guest. "The Hickories is by no means a gay place," she
continued, seating herself beside Alice where they could see the dancers
moving in and out of the long room. "And it isn't a club. There is
just this Casino and the fields for golf and polo. It is a neighborhood
affair--and really the quietest place of the kind in the Lake country.
Too bad you could not have been here three weeks ago for the Kermess."
"So Miss Venable said. They are great fun."
"We revive one occasionally to preserve the Dutch traditions of the
family," continued Dolly. "Mrs. Charles Kimberly--Imogene--gave it this
year. Last year I gave it. You would have seen everybody, especially
the Sea Ridge people. Fritzie, dear?" Dolly paused to stay a slender
young woman who was passing. "Miss Venable," she explained, still
speaking to Alice, "is our favorite cousin and will make you acquainted
with every one."
Fritzie Venable whose lively, brown eyes escaped beauty only through a
certain keenness of expression, stopped with a smile and waited on
Dolly's word.
"I want Mrs. MacBirney to go over to the Nelsons' after a while. This
dance is really a young people's affair," Dolly went on, turning to
Alice. "These are friends of Grace's and Larrie's and I don't know half
of them. Take care of Mrs. MacBirney a moment, Fritzie, will you, while
I find Arthur?" asked Dolly, rising and leaving the two together.
Alice looked after Dolly as she walked away. Dolly had the Kimberly
height and preserved it with a care that gave dignity to her carriage.
Her dignity, indeed, showed in her words as well as in her manner; but
in both it battled with a mental intensity that fought for immediate
expression. Dolly persuaded and dictated unblushingly, though it could
not be said, unpleasingly.
"I know you are enjoying Mrs. De Castro and her lovely home," said
Fritzie to Alice. "Of course," she added as Alice assented, "The Towers
is on a much grander scale. But I think Black Rock is the 'homiest'
place on Second Lake. I suppose since I saw you yesterday you have been
all around?"
"Not quite; but I've met many lovely people."
"You can't help liking Second Lake people. They are a kind-hearted,
generous set--notably so for people of means."
"Aren't such people usually generous?"
Fritzie looked doubtful: "People of large means, perhaps, yes. Indeed,
the only trouble here is, there are too many of that sort. Everybody is
prosperous and everybody, with, I think, two exceptions, contented. I,"
laughed Fritzie, "am one of the exceptions. There being no possibility
of preeminence in the line of means, I believe I have in my role of
discontent a certain distinction; and as far as I can see, as much fun
as anybody. In fact, I've often thought the only place where I should
care to be rich would be among the poor. Where every one overflows with
luxury distinctions are necessarily lost--and I like distinctions.
Isn't this pretty for dancing?"
"Everything over here is pretty," said Alice.
"The place takes its name, 'The Hickories,' from the grove back of it.
You see there was nothing about the Lake itself to serve the purpose of
a country club--no golf course, no polo field. All this stretch of the
eastern shore is a part of The Towers estate, but Mr. Kimberly was good
enough to set it apart for the rest of us--you have met Mr. Robert
Kimberly?"
"Neither of the Mr. Kimberlys as yet."
"There is Charles now." Fritzie indicated a smooth-faced,
youthful-looking man coming in through one of the veranda openings.
"That is he speaking to Dolly. They call him the handsome Kimberly."
Alice smiled: "For a man that's rather a severe handicap, isn't it?"
"To be called handsome?"
"It suggests in a way that good looks are exceptional in the family, and
they are not, for their sister, Mrs. De Castro is very handsome, I
think. Which brother is this?"
"The married brother; the other is Robert. They call him the homely
Kimberly. He isn't really homely, but his face in repose _is_ heavy. He
is the bachelor."
"Mr. MacBirney tells me he is completely wrapped up in business."
"Rather--yes; of late years."
"That, I presume, is why he has never married."
"Perhaps," assented Fritzie with a prudent pause. "Some men," she went
on somewhat vaguely, "get interested, when they are young, in women in
general. And afterward never settle down to any one woman, you know."
"I should think that kind of a man would be tiresome."
Fritzie looked at young Mrs. MacBirney somewhat in surprise, but there
was nothing in Alice's frank eyes to provoke criticism. They met
Fritzie's with an assurance of good-nature that forestalled hostility.
Then, too, Fritzie remembered that Mrs. MacBirney was from the West
where people speak freely. "Robert is deliberate but not a bit
tiresome," was all Fritzie said in answer. "Indeed, he is not
communicative."
"I didn't mean in that way," explained Alice. "I should only be afraid a
man like that would take himself so seriously."
Fritzie laughed: "He wouldn't know what that meant. You had music at
your dinner to-night."
"Lovely music: the Hawaiian singers."
"I was sorry I couldn't be there. They always come out to sing for
Robert when they are in the States, and they are always in dreadful
financial straits when they get as far from home as this, and he is
always making up their deficits. They used to sing at The Towers, from
barges on the lake. But The Towers is hardly ever opened nowadays for a
function. The music over the water with the house illuminated was
simply superb. And the evening winding up with fireworks!" sighed
Fritzie in pleasing retrospect.
"There is Robert now," she continued.. "Do you see him? With Mrs.
Charles Kimberly. They are devoted. Isn't she a slip? And the
daintiest little thing. Robert calls her his little Quakeress--her
people were Quakers. She seems lost among the Kimberlys--though Robert
isn't quite so tall as his brother, only more muscular and slower."
Robert Kimberly with Imogene on his arm entered from the opposite side
of the room and walked across the floor to take her to her husband. His
face was darker than that of Charles and heavier eyebrows rendered his
expression less alert. Fritzie waved a hand at Imogene, who answered
with her fan and greeted Alice.
"And there comes Mrs. Nelson--the pale brunette. Heroic woman, I call
her. She has been fighting her advancing weight for ten years. Isn't
she trim? Heavens, she ought to be. She lives in Paris half the time
and does nothing but dress and flirt."
"And who is it with her?"
"The stately creature with her is Dora Morgan. She is a divorcee. She
likewise lives in Paris and is quite a singer. I haven't heard her
lately but she used to sing a little off the key; she dresses a little
off the key yet, to say nothing of the way she acts sometimes. They are
going to dance."
A small orchestra of stringed instruments with a French horn, hidden
somewhere in a balcony, began the faint strains of a German waltz. The
night was warm. Young people in white strolling through dim veranda
openings into the softly lighted room moved at once out upon the floor
to the rhythm of the music. Others, following, paused within the
doorways to spin out ends of small talk or persist in negligible
disputes. The dancers wore the pretty Hawaiian leis in honor of the
Island singers.
"There were some interesting men at the dinner to-night," said Alice.
"You mean the German refiners? Yes, they are Charles Kimberly's
guests," remarked Fritzie as the floor filled. "There they are now, in
that group in the archway with Mr. Nelson."
"But the smaller man was not at the dinner."
"No, that is Guyot, the French representative of the Kimberlys. He and
George Doane, the bald, good-looking man next to him, have the party in
charge. You met the immense man, Herr Gustav Baumann, at dinner. He is
a great refiner and a Hawaiian planter. They are on their way to
Honolulu now and leave within an hour or two in Robert Kimberly's car
for San Francisco. The Baumanns have known the Kimberlys for
generations. Should you ever think Herr Baumann could dance? He is as
light as a cat on his feet, but he waltzes in the dreadful European
round-and-round way. The black-haired man with the big nose is Lambert,
a friend of his, a promoter and a particularly famous chemist whom
Robert Kimberly, by the way, hates--he is a Belgian. I can't bear him,
either--and, Heavens, Guyot is bringing him over here now to ask me to
dance!"
Fritzie's fear proved true. However, she accepted graciously as Lambert
was brought forward and bowed in making his request. But she did not
fail to observe that though he bowed low, Lambert's bold eyes were glued
on Alice even while he was begging Fritzie for the dance. Something in
Alice's slender face, the white hardly touched enough with pink, except
under animation, held Lambert's glance. Alice, already prejudiced,
directed her eyes as far away as possible under the inspection and was
glad that Fritzie rose at once.
Robert Kimberly joined Baumann and Edward Nelson. "You have not told me
yet, Robert," Baumann began, "how you put in your time here in the
country."
"I have a good secretary and do a great deal of my work here, Gustav."
"But one does not always work. What else? I remember," he continued,
turning to Nelson, "the stories my father used to tell about the
Kimberlys--your father, Robert, and especially your Uncle John."
Baumann radiated interest in everything American. "Those men were busy
men. Not alone sugar-refining, but horses, steamboats, opera-houses,
women--always, always some excitement."
"Other times, other manners, Baumann," suggested Nelson. "In those days
a fine horse had a national interest; to-day, everybody's horse does his
mile in two minutes. The railroads long ago killed the steamboats;
newsboys build the opera-houses now; sugar refines itself. Mere
money-making, Baumann, has become so absorbing that a Kimberly of this
generation doesn't have time to look at a woman."
"Nelson!" protested the good-natured and perspiring German, "no time to
look at a woman? That, at least, cannot be true, can it, Robert?"
"Not quite. But I imagine the interest has waned," said Kimberly.
"When a man took his life in his hand on such a venture the excitement
gave it a double zest--the reflection that you were an outlaw but
prepared, if necessary, to pay the price with your life. Nowadays, the
husband has fallen lower than the libertine. If you break up his
home--he sues you. There is nothing hair-raising in that. Will you
dance, Gustav?"
"I want very much to dance. Your women dance better than ours."
"Why, your women dance beautifully. Nelson will find you a partner,"
suggested Kimberly. "I must hunt up Mrs. Nelson. I have a dance with
her, myself."
Alice sat for a moment alone. Among the dancers, Robert Kimberly moved
past her with Lottie Nelson on his arm. Alice noticed how handsome and
well poised Lottie was on her feet; Kimberly she thought too cold to be
an attractive partner.
Within a moment Dolly came back. "I can't find Arthur anywhere."
"He isn't on the floor, Mrs. De Castro."
"No matter, I will let him find me. Isn't it a pretty company? I do
love these fresh faces," remarked Dolly, sitting down. "The young
people complain of our being exclusive. That is absurd. We have to
keep quiet, otherwise why live in the country? Besides, what would be
gained by opening the doors?"
Dolly had a pleasing way of appealing in difficulties, or what seemed
such, even to a stranger. "We don't want ambitious people," she went on;
"they are killing, you know--and we certainly don't want any more like
ourselves. As Arthur says," Dolly laughed a little rippling laugh, "'we
have social liabilities enough of our own.'"
Arthur De Castro came up just in time to hear his name: "What's that
Arthur says, Dolly?"
"Oh, here you are!" exclaimed his wife. "No matter, dear, what it was."
"It is certain Arthur never said anything of the kind, Mrs. MacBirney,"
interposed De Castro. "If any one said it, it must have been you,
Dolly."
Alice laughed at the two. "No matter who said it," remarked Dolly,
dismissing the controversy, "somebody said it. It really sounds more
like Robert than anybody else."
"You will be aware very soon, Mrs. MacBirney," continued De Castro,
"that the Kimberlys say all manner of absurd things--and they are not
always considerate enough to father them on some one else, either."
Alice turned to her hostess with amused interest: "You, of course, are
included because you are a Kimberly."
"She is more Kimberly _than_ the Kimberlys," asserted her husband. "I
am not a Kimberly." Arthur De Castro in apologizing bowed with so real a
deprecation that both women laughed.
"Of course, the young people rebel," persisted Dolly, pursuing her
topic, and her dark hair touched with gray somehow gave an authority to
her pronouncements, "young people always want a circle enlarged, but a
circle _never_ should be. What is it you want, Arthur?"
"I am merely listening."
"Don't pretend that you leave the men just to listen to me. You want
Mrs. MacBirney to dance."
"She is always like that," declared De Castro to Alice, whom he found
pleasing because her graciousness seemed to invite its like. "Just such
bursts of divination. At times they are overwhelming. I remember how
stunned I was when she cried--quite before I could get my breath: 'You
want to marry me!'"
"Was she right?" laughed Alice, looking from one to the other.
"Absolutely."
"Is she right now?"
"Dolly is always right."
"Then I suppose I must dance."
"Not, of course, unless you want to."
Alice appealed to Dolly: "What did you do?"
"I said I wouldn't marry him."
"But you did," objected her companion.
"He was so persistent!"
Alice laughingly rose: "Then it would be better to consent at once."
Dolly rose with her. Two of the dancers stopped before them: a tall,
slender girl and a ruddy-faced, boyish young man.
"Grace," said Dolly to the blue-eyed girl, "I want you to meet Mrs.
MacBirney. This is my niece, Grace De Castro."
The young girl looked with pretty expectancy into Alice's face, and
frankly held out her hand.
"Oh, what a bloom!" exclaimed Alice, looking at the delicate features
and transparent skin. Grace laughed happily. Alice kept her hand a
moment: "You are like a bit of morning come to life, Grace."
"And this is my cousin, Mrs. MacBirney--Mr. Morgan," said Grace shyly.
Larrie Morgan, a bit self-conscious, stood for an instant aloof. Alice
said nothing, but her eyes in the interval worked their spell. He
suddenly smiled.
"I'm mightily pleased to meet you, Mrs. MacBirney," he exclaimed with
heartiness. "We've all heard about you. Is Mr. MacBirney here?" he
continued, tendering the biggest compliment he could think of.
"He is somewhere about, I think."
"We shall lose our waltz, Mrs. MacBirney," urged Arthur De Castro.
"Oh, we mustn't do that. Let's run," whispered Alice, taking his arm.
"Who is Mrs. MacBirney?" asked Grace of Larrie with an appealing look as
Alice moved away.
"Why, don't you know? Her husband owns some beet plants."
"What lovely manners she has." Grace spoke under her breath. "And so
quiet. Where are their refineries, Larrie?"
"In the West."
"Where in the West?"
"Somewhere out toward the Rocky Mountains," hazarded Larrie.
"Denver?" suggested Grace doubtfully.
"I fancy that's it. Anyway," explained Larrie coldly, "we are buying
them."
"Are you?" asked Grace, lifting her soft eyes timidly.
To her, Larrie was the entire Kimberly sugar interest; and at the moment
of making the MacBirney purchase he looked, to Grace, the part.