GORDON RETURNS
And then, after a very short time, the parting came. I was the first to
advise it. She could no longer remain in the little, decrepit boarding
house. People would come to see her; she had to have a decent home, a
place in which she could receive some of the members of this new world
she had taken by storm. We had looked together over the accounts in the
papers; it was nothing less than a triumph. Richetti was making all
sorts of arrangements for her.
After a long dispute she consented to take my piano with her.
"I'm afraid she won't do it," Frieda had told me, when I broached the
subject to her.
"I--I should be so glad to think it had belonged to--to the only two
women I have--have ever----"
"Poor darling David," said the sweet old painter, wiping her glasses,
"Why--why don't you speak?"
"Because--just because," I answered.
"I know, she is moving into another world now. I am glad she is taking
Eulalie with her. But she can never forget you, Dave. You will always be
the best and dearest of friends to her. You must go and see her often."
"I'm afraid it will never be quite the same, Frieda. She will have a
little parlor now, and it won't be like the room she trusted me to
enter, the place where Baby Paul first saw the light, the dingy quarters
in which her new voice was born. Oh! Frieda! Have we ever fully realized
how patient she was, how resigned? We surely never did because we could
not know how great her loss had been. We merely had an idea that she had
been deprived of a few golden notes, and all the time she knew that she
had lost a treasure beyond compare. And yet how brave she was through it
all! With what courage she went to work in that poor little shop to gain
the pittance that might keep her and Baby Paul farther from want! We
have never once heard her whimper, nor has she ever seemed really
discouraged. Sometimes she showed great sadness, of course, but it was
born of her misfortune and of her fears for the little one, because of
the love for him that surged in her heart. God! Frieda, but you women
are brave and strong!"
"Yes, David dear, especially when we find a good man to lean upon," she
answered.
And so, as I have said, Frances went away to a very decent little
apartment Frieda found for her, and Eulalie was installed in a kitchen
of her own, and the latchstring was always out for us. I enjoyed some
pleasant days of tacking a few photos on the walls and hanging
portieres. Some of the time I had to work alone, for she was much taken
up. Three weeks after the concert she went away on a tour, having joined
forces with Tsheretshewski, the great cellist, an obese and long haired
artist with a wife and seven children, who became a thing of poetry and
beauty when he played. I heard them in Carnegie Hall, and then they went
off on a tour that took them as far as Chicago and St. Louis, and my
agency for newspaper cuttings kept on sending me articles by real or
alleged critics. Eulalie traveled with her, and the baby also went from
town to town. Frances sent me many postals and, often, letters. The
latter always began with "Dearest Dave."
Then came the spring again and a meeting that was positively dreadful,
during which Frances pulled out little rags of paper full of her
scribbling and covered over with numbers which represented her
indebtedness to me. We fought like cats and dogs over the items, till,
finally, she proudly pulled out a checkbook from a little desk and wrote
out the amount, signing the thing boldly and declaring that she would
never speak to me again unless I took it.
"You see, David dear," she explained, "everything is all right now and I
am making lots of money, and you can't refuse, because you know I only
accepted in the hope that I would be able to pay it all back some day,
and it will leave me a debtor to you for a million things, and Baby Paul
too!"
During the summer she went to Newport, where Richetti gave another
concert and where he made her a flattering offer to help in his teaching
of the infinitely rich and sometimes voiceless. Thank goodness that a
press of work came to me, for Ceballo, the great manager, actually
sought me out and insisted on collaborating with me in a dramatization
of "Land o' Love," which had passed its second hundred thousand. He
nearly drove me to insanity, while we toiled at it, and I would have
cried mercy before the end, but for the furious energy with which he
kept me a prisoner of his wiles.
Then I spent a few weeks in the Adirondacks, having found a small hotel
where people never put on war-paint for dinner and no one was ashamed to
wear flannel shirts, and I rowed and pretended to fish and lost myself
in the woods to my heart's content, finally returning to my old
typewriter with a mass of notes for a further novel. I took up once more
my lonely vigils, when I could, because I began to feel the grasp of
many cogwheels that were the penalty of success. Some magazines actually
requested stories of me.
About the first of October I received a cablegram from Gordon, which
appalled me with its suddenness.
"Home by _Rochambeau_. Get old girl to clean up. Can't drive
ambulance any more.
"GORDON."
It was simply maddening. Why couldn't he drive? Of course he had been
hurt. Why didn't he tell me what was the matter? Poor old chap, in spite
of some of his ways there is no man on earth I have ever been so fond
of, because, at bottom, there is something very manly and genuine in
him. When things got too hot for him he didn't go off somewhere and
mope; no, he naturally went and gave the best that was in him to a
service of noble charity and virile endeavor.
I ascertained over the phone the date of the _Rochambeau's_ probable
arrival and walked up the Avenue to a meeting with Ceballo, who was
worrying me to death over the ending of the fourth act. He's a most
obstinate man. At a busy corner I stopped to allow the passage of a
flood of autos. The crowd behind me pressed me forward, nearly against a
powerful gray roadster.
"Jump in quick, Mr. Cole," came a woman's voice.
I looked up. It was Miss Sophia Van Rossum who had spoken. The chauffeur
was in a little seat behind her and I swiftly obeyed, glad indeed to see
her again.
"Are you in a hurry to go anywhere, Mr. Cole, because I'll be glad to
take you wherever you want to go?"
"No," I replied, "I was killing time for about an hour. After that I
have an appointment."
"Then we can take a little turn in the Park," she said, approvingly.
The carriages and motors were so numerous that for some time we said
very little. I watched her self-reliant, skilful driving, and took an
occasional glance at her profile. It was beautiful as ever, perhaps more
so than ever, colored with health and a fair coat of tan. Once in the
Park, however, we found more room and she drove with less preoccupation.
"I--I've heard from you but twice this summer, Mr. Cole. Thank you for
letting me know that Gordon was still well. Have you any further news of
him?"
"Yes, I have just heard," I replied. "He is on his way back and I wrote
you this morning at Southampton."
I watched her closely. For a moment she drove on, looking neither to the
right or left, but I saw that her lower lip was being pressed on by her
teeth.
"He--he never let me know," she finally said. "I--I hope he will return
well and happy."
"Pardon me. I am afraid that something has happened to him," I said,
again. "Gordon is the sort of fellow who would see the thing through. He
would go on to the end, you know, and--and he didn't write, this time. I
have the cable here. You might stop a moment under these trees."
She brought the machine to a standstill, gently, with no undue pressure
of brake, losing none of her expertness, and put her hand out for the
paper I held.
"I see," she said, very simply and quietly, though the paper shook a
little in her grasp. "He has been very badly hurt, Mr. Cole. Otherwise
he would have remained, until he was well again, to take up the work
once more. I--I would give anything on earth to meet that steamer!"
"The easiest thing in the world, Miss Van Rossum."
"No, the hardest, the most impossible," she retorted, quickly. "He--he
might not be glad to see me, else he would have cabled me also, I think.
You will be there, of course! Be very sure you meet him, Mr. Cole, and
then, please--please let me know what has happened, and find out for me
whether there is anything I can do. You promise, don't you?"
I put out my hand and she crushed it, nervously, with wonderful
strength, and let it go at once.
"We will go on now, I think," she said, and pressed the selfstarter.
Soon we were in the main driveway again, among a flooding and ebbing
tide of carriages and motors. Some women bowed to her and she returned
the salutations with a graceful move of her head. She drove as easily as
usual, and the turn was completed. Finally, she dropped me off at the
club and went on, after brief but very genuine thanks.
"Good Lord! David," said Ceballo, a moment later. "Just caught sight of
you with Diana at the wheel. Splendid young lady, isn't she? I know her
father quite well."
"Yes," I answered, "she is a very fine young woman."
"Doesn't much care for literature, does she?"
"I don't know, but she has a heart of gold, and that's what counts."
So we retired to a small private table and disputed and argued for a
couple of hours, at the end of which my brains were addled and I told
him to do as he pleased, whereat he beamed and I parted from him.
Then I began counting the days till the _Rochambeau_ should arrive, and
Frances came back to town and sent me word at once. She received me
joyfully and told me how much good the sea-air on the Newport cliffs had
done Baby Paul, who was beginning to talk like a little man and to say
"God bless David" in the prayer he babbled after her each evening.
"I'm only back for a short time," she said, "because I'm to sing at a
concert in Boston next week, and then we are going to Buffalo for a day,
after which I shall return. And what do you think, David? I am to sign
an engagement for the Metropolitan! Tsheretshewski is going abroad this
winter to play in Spain and England, and so I shall be, for the whole
winter, here in New York, and--and I hope you won't neglect me."
I assured her that I would call every day, and left her, after I had
inspected Baby Paul, who deigned to let me kiss him and favored my
moustache with a powerful tug. He is a stunning infant. She was standing
at the outer door of her apartment, her dear sweet smile speaking of her
friendship and regard. The temptation came on me again, the awful
longing for a touch of those lips, but I held myself within bounds, as
bravely as I could, and touched the elevator signal. She waited until
the cage had shot up and waved her hand at me. Her "Good-by, Dave" held
all the charm of her song and the tenderness of her heart, I thought,
and I answered it with a catch in my throat.
"You will never be anything but a big over-grown kid, David," Frieda had
told me, a few days before. Ay! I realized it! I would never cease
crying for that radiant moon. Sometimes, in silly dreams, I have seen
myself standing before her, with her two hands in mine, with her lips
near, with her heart ready to come into my keeping. But, when I waken, I
remember the words she said last year, when Gordon made her so unhappy.
How could love be left in her heart? she had asked. Was there ever a
night when she didn't kneel and pray for the poor soul of the man buried
somewhere in France, in those dreadful fields, with, perhaps, never a
cross over him nor a flower to bear to him a little of the love she had
given? Let well enough alone, David, my boy! You can have her song
whenever you care to beg for it, and her friendship and her smiles.
Would you forfeit these things because you must come forth and beg for
more, ay, for more than she can give you? Would you force her dear eyes
to shed tears of sorrow for you, and hear her soft voice breaking with
the pain it would give her to refuse?
A few days later she met me at her door, excitedly, and told me that
Baby Paul had a slight cold and that Dr. Porter had advised her not to
take him away with her.
"And, Dave, I just have to go! It would be too hard on some of the
others, if I broke faith and didn't appear. I must leave to-night, and
it just breaks my heart to be compelled to start when my Baby Paul isn't
well. Dr. Porter has promised to call every day and see him during my
absence. Dave dear, you are ever so fond of Baby too. Won't you come in
every day, and you must telegraph, if you don't find him getting along
as well as he should, or use the long distance telephone."
She was much agitated, and I saw how hard it was on her to leave the
dear little man behind. But Frances is the sort of woman who keeps her
promises. She has given her word and will go!
So we dined together, that evening, with Frieda, and we saw Frances away
to the train and put her on board the sleeper and returned home, and
Frieda spoke a great deal and told me about the sale of her latest
picture and all that she expected from the one she was going to exhibit
at the winter Salon. It was only after I had left her that I realized
the dear soul had been trying to divert my thoughts.
In the morning came the telegram from the marine department of the cable
company. The _Rochambeau_ would dock at eleven. I was at the waterside
an hour earlier, devoured with impatience and anxiety, thinking of a
thousand alarming possibilities. Finally, the big ship appeared, far
down the stream, and slowly came up. I scanned the decks as soon as
people could be distinguished, but could see no sign of my friend.
At last, the steamer was warped into the dock after three puffing tugs
had pushed and shoved her for the longest time, and the passengers began
to come off, and still he did not show up and the gang plank was nearly
bare of people. I seized upon a steward bearing ashore a load of
suitcases and bags and asked him whether there was not a Mr. McGrath on
board.
"_Certainement, Monsieur_, there he is coming now," replied the man,
hurrying away.
I might not have recognized him, so pale and thin did he look, but it
was Gordon all right, at the head of the trussed gangway, and he waved a
hand at me. A man preceded him, carrying some baggage.
"Hello, Gordon!" I shouted joyfully, in spite of the shock his sharp,
worn features had given me.
"Hello, Dave!" he cried back.
A moment later he was down on the dock, stepping lightly, and I pushed
my hand out towards him, eager for the strong grasp of former days.
"You'll have to take the left, old boy. The right one's behind,
somewhere in Belgium. Wait a moment and I'll give you my keys, Dave. I
have to keep everything in my lefthand pockets, so they're crowded. Yes,
I have them. I suppose that my trunk is already ashore. Do try and get
a customs' officer for me and hurry the thing through."
He was talking as calmly and coolly as if he had been gone but a few
days and had suffered only from a cut finger. We were fortunate in being
able to get through the formalities very soon, and, shortly after, we
drove away in a taxi.
"Well, Dave, how've you been and how's everybody?" he asked, after
lighting a cigarette from mine.
"Every one is all right," I answered impatiently. "Oh! Gordon, old man!
How did it ever happen?"
"Just a piece of shell while I was picking some fellows up," he
answered. "You have no idea of how surprising it is when you suddenly
realize that something's missing. But what's a hand more or less after
all that I've seen? How's Frieda?"
"Stouter than ever," I replied, "and her appetite's improving. Porter
recommended a diet, but she won't follow it. Says her fat doesn't
interfere with her sitting at the easel."
"Good old Frieda! I've heard about your book, Dave, it made a big stir,
didn't it? And so--so Madame Dupont has become a great singer again;
heard all about it from a fellow on board and, of course, your letters
spoke of it; but you're such a crazy old duffer I supposed you were
getting carried away with your enthusiasm. Never could take things
quietly, could you? Any other news?"
"Nothing very special," I told him. "The Van Rossums came to town early,
this year. I--I've seen Miss Sophia."
"Have you? Give me another cigarette. Yes, light a match for me. I'm
clumsy as the devil with that left hand!"
He sat back, puffing at the thing and looking out of the window.
"Peanuts," he said. "Haven't seen a peanut cart for over a year. Colored
women, too. Plenty of fighting niggers in France, but no darky ladies.
Look at the big cop! Policemen are the only leisure class in this
country, aren't they? Lord! What a big, ghastly brick monstrosity that
is! We can lick the world when it comes to fetid commercial
architecture, can't we? Are you going all the way up to the studio with
me?"
"Of course I am," I asserted indignantly. "What did you suppose I'd do?"
"Thought you might laugh at the uselessness of a studio in my present
condition," he replied negligently. "I've told you I'm clumsy as the
deuce with that left hand. Tried to draw a face with it the other day,
in pencil. Looked like a small boy's effort on a fence. So, of course,
I'm through with painting. I've been rather saving, you know. Invested
my money quite safely and haven't spent much on this jaunt. Of course a
few thousands went where I thought they'd do most good. A fellow who'd
keep his hands in his pockets when help is so badly needed would be a
queer animal. But I've enough to live on and smoke decent tobacco. I
think I'll take a small bachelor apartment in New York, to come to when
I get the horrors. I'll spend the rest of the time in the country, a
good way off. I'll read books, yes, even yours, and, perhaps, learn to
sit around with a crowd, near a grocery stove, and discuss potatoes and
truck. Hang it all! There's always something a fellow can do!"
"My dear Gordon," I began, "I don't see----"
"Oh, shut up, Dave, I know all the things one can say to a cripple.
What's the use? Some fellows on board asked me to dine with them this
evening at Delmonico's, and I damned them up and down. Sat for eight
mortal days at the dining-table on the ship, with an infernal female on
each side of me; they'd quarrel as to which of them would cut my meat
for me. It's enough for a fellow to go dotty. Sometimes I wouldn't go
and had things served in my cabin so the steward would do the cutting.
Understand, I'm not kicking. Hang it all, man, I'm not even sorry I
went! The chaps I helped out were probably worth it. Great old
experience trying to make fifty miles an hour with a fellow inside
bleeding to death, I can tell you. I've seen enough of it to have
learned that a man's life doesn't amount to much. Any old thing will do
for me now."
I was appalled. All this had but one meaning. He was eating his heart
out, try as he might to conceal it. To him, his art had been chiefly a
means to an end; he had made it the servant of his desires. And now it
was getting back at him, it was revenging itself, appearing infinitely
desirable for its own sake. He would miss it as a man misses the dead
woman, who has held his heart in the hollow of her hand; he was raging
at the helplessness that had come upon him. And all this he translated
into his usual cynicism. I would have given anything to have seen him
break down and weep, so that I might have put my arm around his
shoulders and sought to comfort him with love and affection.
We got out at the big building, and he nodded to the colored boy who
stood at the door of the elevator, as if he had been gone but a day. On
the landing he sought again to pull out his keys, but I touched the
electric button and the old woman's steps hurried to the door.
"How are you?" he said, and brushed past her, paying no heed to her
salutations. "Glad everything's open. I was afraid it would be all
closed up like a beastly morgue. Hello!"
He stopped before the easel. Upon it I had placed a rough study he had
made for Miss Van Rossum's picture. It was a thing of a few effective
and masterly strokes.
"Good Lord, Dave, but I was a painter for fair, once upon a time! How
did I ever do it?"
He sat there, very still, for a long time, while I watched him. I think
he had forgotten all about me, for, after a time, he rose and pulled out
of a closet some unframed canvasses, which he scattered against the legs
of furniture and contemplated.
"Think I'll make a bonfire of them," he suddenly said. "Won't be such an
idiot as to keep on staring at those things and looking at my stump,
I'll warrant," and he pushed the handless wrist towards me, tied up in a
bit of black silk.
Then the telephone rang.
"Wonder who's the infernal idiot calling up now?" he said. "Go and
answer, Dave. No, I'll go myself and tell him to go to the devil!"
Then came one of those fragmentary conversations. I could not help
hearing it, of course. It surprised me that he spoke quietly, with a
civility of tone and accent I had not expected.
"Yes, came back a few minutes ago----No, Dave ran up here with me, Dave
Cole, you know----Oh! Nothing much----Well, I've lost my hand, the one I
painted with----Yes, I shall be glad to have you do so----Right away?
Yes, if you want to, I mean if you will be so kind. Thank you ever so
much!"
He hung up the receiver and turned to me, his eyes looking rather
haggard.
"It's--it's Sophia Van Rossum. How did she know I was coming?"
"I let her know, of course," I answered rather shortly.
"You think I've treated her pretty badly, don't you?"
"Rottenly, Gordon!"
"I daresay I did. It was a sort of madness that came over me, but--but
there's no excuse. She'll be here in a few minutes. I don't know what I
can say to her. Stay here, Dave, and help me out. I used to tell you
that she was just a society doll, and that sort of thing. Well, she's
pretty strong on society, but she was brought up in it, belonged to it.
But she's a great deal more of a woman than I gave her credit for being;
I've realized it a thousand times since I've been gone. I call it mighty
decent of her to ring me up and offer to come around and see me, after
the way I've behaved to her."
"So do I, Gordon," I approved. "She's got a great big heart, the sort
it's a sorry thing for a man to play with."
He made no answer, looking out from his window into the Park and its
yellowing foliage. Then he lifted his maimed arm and stared at it.