After John had gone away the house was very quiet. Only from the room
upstairs there could be heard occasionally the faint clear cry of Deborah's
child. And once again to Roger came a season of repose. He was far from
unhappy. His disease, although progressing fast, gave him barely any pain;
it rather made its presence felt by the manner in which it affected his
mind. His inner life grew uneven. At times his thoughts were as in a fog,
again they were amazingly clear and vistas opened far ahead. He could not
control his thinking.
This bothered him at the office, in the work he still had to do. For some
months he had been considering an offer from one of his rivals, a modern
concern which wished to buy out his business together with that of three
other firms and consolidate them all into one corporation. And Roger was
selling, and it was hard; for the whole idea of bargaining was more
distasteful than ever now. He had to keep reminding himself of Edith and
her children.
At last it was over, his books were closed, and there was nothing left to
be done. Nor did he care to linger. These rooms had meant but little to
him; they had been but a place of transition from the old office far
downtown, so full of memories of his youth, to the big corporation looming
ahead, the huge impersonal clipping mill into which his business was to
merge. And it came to his mind that New York was like that--no settled calm
abiding place cherishing its memories, but only a town of transition, a
great turbulent city of change, restlessly shaking off its past, tearing
down and building anew, building higher, higher, higher, rearing to the
very stars, and shouting, "Can you see me now?" What was the goal of this
mad career? What dazzling city would be here? For a time he stared out of
his window as into a promised land. Slowly at last he rose from his desk.
Clippings, clippings, clippings. He looked at those long rows of girls
gleaning in items large and small the public reputations of all kinds of
men and women, new kinds in a new nation seething with activities, sweeping
on like some wide river swollen at flood season to a new America, a world
which Roger would not know. And yet it would be his world still, for in it
he would play a part.
"In their lives, too, we shall be there--the dim strong figures of the
past."
From his desk he gathered a few belongings. Then he looked into John's
small room, with the big gold motto over the desk: "This is no place for
your troubles or mine." On the desk lay that small album, John's parting
gift to Deborah's boy. Roger picked it up and walked out of the office. He
had never liked good-byes.
In the elevator he noticed that his shoes needed shining, and when he
reached the street below he stopped at the stand on the corner. The stocky
Greek with bushy black hair, who had run the stand for many years, gave him
a cheery greeting; for Roger had stopped there frequently--not that he
cared about his shoes, but he had always liked to watch the crowds of
people passing.
"No hurry, boss?"
"None," said Roger.
"Then I give a fine shine! Polish, too?"
"Yes, polish, too." And Roger settled back to watch.
"And put in new shoe strings," he added, with a whimsical smile.
Men and women, girls and boys by thousands passed him, pushing, hurrying,
shuffling by. Girls tittering and nudging and darting quick side glances.
Bobbing heads and figures, vigorous steps and dancing eyes. Life bubbling
over everywhere, in laughter, in sharp angry tones, in glad expectant
chatter. Deborah's big family. Across the street was a movie between two
lurid posters, and there was a dance hall overhead. The windows were all
open, and faintly above the roar of the street he could hear the piano,
drum, fiddle and horn. The thoroughfare each moment grew more tumultuous to
his ears, with trolley cars and taxis, motor busses, trucks and drays. A
small red motor dashed uptown with piles of evening papers; a great black
motor hearse rushed by. In a taxi which had stopped in a jam, a man was
kissing a girl in his arms, and both of them were laughing. The smart
little toque of blue satin she wore was crushed to one side. How red were
her lips as she threw back her head....
"Silk or cotton, boss? Which you like?" Roger glanced at the shoe strings
and pondered.
"Silk," he grunted in reply. Idly for a moment he watched this busy little
man. From whence had he come in far away Greece? What existence had he
here, and what kind of life would he still have through those many years to
come? A feeling half of sadness crept into Roger's heavy eyes as he looked
at the man, at his smiling face and then at other faces in the multitudes
sweeping past. The moment he tried to single them out, how doubly chaotic
it became. What an ocean of warm desires, passions, vivid hopes and
worries. Vaguely he could feel them pass. Often in the midst of his life,
his active and self-centered life, Roger had looked at these crowds on the
street and had thought these faces commonplace. But now at the end it was
not so.
A woman with a baby carriage stopped directly in front of him and stood
there anxiously watching for a chance to cross the street. And Roger
thought of Deborah. Heavily he climbed down from his seat, paid the man and
bade him good-night, and went home to see Deborah's baby.
For a long time he sat by the cradle. Presently Deborah joined him, and
soon they were laughing heartily at the astonishing jerks and kicks and
grimaces of the tiny boy. He was having his bath and he hated it. But safe
at last on his mother's lap, wrapped to his ears in a big soft towel, he
grew very gay and contented and looked waggishly about.
There followed long lazy days of spring, as April drifted into May. Early
in the morning Roger could hear through his window the cries of the vendors
of flowers and fruits. And he listened drowsily. He rose late and spent
most of the day in the house; but occasionally he went out for a stroll.
And one balmy evening when groups of youths came trooping by, singing in
close harmony, Roger called a taxi and went far down through the tenement
streets to a favorite haunt of his, a little Syrian pawnshop, where after
long delving he purchased a ring to put in the new collection that he had
been making lately. He had nearly a dozen now.
Days passed. The house was still so quiet, Deborah was still upstairs. At
last, one night upon leaving his study, he stopped uncertainly in the hall.
He took more time than was his wont in closing up the house for the night,
in trying all the windows, in turning out the various lights. Room after
room he left in the dark. Then he went slowly up the stairs, his hand
gratefully feeling those guiding points grown so familiar to his touch
through many thousand evenings. His hand lingered on the banister and he
stopped again to listen there.
He did not come downstairs again.
He was able to sleep but little at night. Turning restlessly on his bed, he
would glance out of the window up at the beetling wall close by, tier on
tier of apartments from which faint voices dropped out of the dark.
Gradually as the night wore on, these voices would all die away into long
mysterious silences--for to him at least such silences had grown to be
very mysterious. Alone in the hours that followed, even these modern
neighbors and this strange new eager town pressing down upon his house
seemed no longer strange to him nor so appallingly immense, seemed even
familiar and small to him, as the eyes of his mind looked out ahead.
From his bed he could see on the opposite wall the picture Judith had given
him, always so fresh and cool and dim with its deep restful tones of blue,
of the herdsmen and the cattle on the dark mountain rim at dawn. And
vaguely he wondered whether it was because he saw more clearly, or whether
his mind in this curious haze could no longer see so well, that as he
looked before him he felt no fear nor any more uncertainty. All his doubts
had lifted, he was so sure of Judith now. As though she were coming to meet
him, her image grew more vivid, with memories emerging out of all the years
gone by. What memories, what vivid scenes! What intimate conversations they
had, her voice so natural, close in his ear, as together they planned for
their children.... Wistfully he would search the years for what he should
soon tell his wife--until the drowsiness returned, and then again came
visions.
But by day it was not so, for the life of the house would rouse him and at
intervals hold his attention.
One evening a slight rustle, a faint fragrance in the room, made Roger
suddenly open his eyes. And he saw Laura by his bed, her slender figure
clad in blue silk, something white at her full bosom. He noticed her
shapely shoulders, her glossy hair and moist red lips. She was smiling down
at him.
"See what I've brought you, dear," she said. And she turned to a chair
where, one on the other, tray after tray, was piled his whole collection of
rings. At sight of them his eyes grew fixed; he could feel his pulse beat
faster.
"How did you ever find them?" he asked his daughter huskily.
"Oh, I had a long hunt all by myself. But I found them at last and I've
brought them home. Shall we look them over a little while?"
"Yes," he said. She turned up the light, and came and sat down at the
bedside with a tray of rings in her lap. One by one she held them up to his
gaze, still smiling and talking softly on in that rich melodious voice of
hers, of which he heard but snatches. How good it felt to be so gay. No
solemn thoughts nor questionings, just these dusky glittering beauties
here, deep soft gleams of color, each with its suggestion of memories for
Roger, a procession of adventures reaching back into his life. He smiled
and lay in silence watching, until at last she bent over him, kissed him
softly, breathed a good-night and went out of the room. Roger followed her
with his glance. He knew he would never see her again. How graceful of her
to go like that.
He lay there thinking about her. In her large blue limousine he saw his gay
young daughter speeding up the Avenue, the purple gleaming pavement
reflecting studded lines of lights. And he thought he could see her smiling
still. He recalled scattered fragments of her life--the first luxurious
little ménage, and the second. How many more would there be? She was only
in her twenties still. Uneasily he tried to see into the years ahead for
her, and he thought he saw a lonely old age, childless, loveless, cynical,
hard. But this fear soon fell from his mind. No, whatever happened, she
would do it gracefully, an artist always, to the end. He sighed and gave up
the effort. For he could not think of Laura as old, nor could he think of
her any more as being a part of his family.
Edith came to him several times, and there was something in her face which
gave him sharp forebodings. Making a great effort he tried to talk to her
clearly.
"It's hard to keep up with your children," he said. "It means keeping up
with everything new. And you stay in your rut and then it's too late.
Before you know it you are old."
But his words subsided in mutterings, and Roger wearily closed his eyes.
For a glance up into Edith's face had shown him only pity there and no heed
to his warning. He saw that she looked upon him as old and still upon
herself as young, though he noticed the threads of gray in her hair....
Then he realized she had gone and that his chamber had grown dark. He must
have been dreaming. Of what, he asked. He tried to remember. And suddenly
out of the darkness, so harsh and clear it startled him, a picture rose in
Roger's mind of a stark lonely figure, a woman in a graveyard cutting the
grass on family graves. Where had he seen it? He could not recall. What had
it to do with Edith? Was she not living in New York?... What had so
startled him just now? Some thought, some vivid picture, some nightmare he
could not recall.
His last talks were with Deborah. All through those days and the long
nights, too, he kept fancying she was in the room, and it brought deep balm
to his restless soul. He asked her to tell him about the schools, and
Deborah talked to him quietly. She was going back to her work in the fall.
She felt very humble about it--she told him she felt older now and she saw
that her work was barely begun. But she was even happier than before. Her
hand lay in his, and it tightened there. He opened his eyes and looked up
into hers.
"All so strange," he muttered, "life." There was a sharp contracting of her
wide and sensitive mouth.
"Yes, dear, strange!" she whispered.
"But I'm so glad you're going on." He frowned as he tried to be simple and
clear, and make her feel he understood what she had set herself to do. "All
people," he said slowly, "never counted so much as now. And never so
hungry--all--as now--for all of life--like children--children who should go
to school. Your work will grow--I can see ahead. Never a time when every
man and woman and child could grow so much--and hand it on--and hand it
on--as you will do to your small son."
He felt her hand on his forehead, and for some moments nothing was said.
Vaguely in glimpses Roger saw his small grandson growing up; and he
pictured other children here, not her own but of her greater family, as the
two merged into one. He felt that she would not grow old. Children, lives
of children; work, dreams and aspirations. How bright it seemed as he
stared ahead. Then he heard the cry of her baby.
"Shall I nurse him here?" he heard her ask. He pressed her hand in answer.
And when again he opened his eyes she was by his side with the child at her
breast. Its large round eyes, so pure and clear, gazed into his own for a
long, long time.
"Now he's so sleepy," she whispered. "Would you like him beside you a
moment?"
"Please."
He felt the faint scent of the tiny boy, and still those eyes looked into
his. He forgot his daughter standing there; and as he watched, a sweet
fresh sense of the mystery of this life so new stole deep into his spirit.
All at once the baby fell asleep.
"Good-night, little brother," he whispered. "God grant the world be very
kind." He could feel the mother lift it up, and he heard the door close
softly.
Smiling he, too, fell asleep. And after that there were only dreams.