He recovered rapidly; his hard work had strengthened his constitution,
and Molly Shannon modestly withdrew, and Mary Kenny, the landlady, who
had disputed the place from the first, took it and gave Antony what
further care he needed. He missed Molly the first day she left him,
missed her shawl and hat and the music of her Irish voice. He had sent
for books through Joe Mead, and read furiously, realizing how long he
had been without intellectual food.
But the books made him wretched.
Not one of them was written for an artist who had been forced by hard
luck to turn into a day labourer. All the beautiful things he read made
him suffer and desire and long, and worse still, made him rebel. One
phrase out of Werther lingered and fascinated him--
"The miseries of mankind would be lighter if--God knows why this is
so--if they would not use all their imagination to remember their
miseries and to recall to themselves the souvenirs of their unhappy
past."
The unhappy past! Well, was it not sad at his age to have a past so
melancholy that one could not recall it without tears?
Every one but Sanders came to see him, and jolly him up. Joe Mead gave
him to understand that he only lived for the time when Tony should come
back to feed "the Girl," as he called his engine. Tony looked at his
chief out of cavernous eyes. Joe Mead had on his Sunday clothes and
would not light his cigar out of deference to Tony's sick-room.
"You're forty, Mead, aren't you?"
"About that, I guess."
"And I am only twenty-three," returned Fairfax. "Is that going to be a
picture of me at forty?" he thought, and answered himself violently: "My
mother's pride and mine forbid."
"Sanders doesn't come to see me, Joe?"
"Nope," returned the other, "you bet your life. If he ain't waiting for
you at the door with a gun when you come down it's only because he is
off on his job."
When his chief got up to leave him, Fairfax said, "I want you to get me
a book on mechanics, Joe, practical mechanics, and don't pay over a
dollar and a half."
He owed Molly Shannon more than he could ever return. The doctor told
him, because he imagined that it would give the young fireman
satisfaction, that the nursing had saved his life. Sanders was not at
the stair-foot when Fairfax finally crept down to take his first
outing. It was the middle of February and a mild day. Indeed, he had
been at work over a fortnight when he caught sight of Molly and Sanders
standing at the head of Nut Street, talking.
As he came up to them, Sanders turned a face clouded with passion on
Fairfax.
"You cursed hound!" he growled under his breath, and struck out, but
before he could reach Fairfax Molly threw herself on Sanders and caught
the blow on her arm and shoulder. In spite of her courage she cried out
and would have fallen but for Fairfax. The blow, furiously directed by
an able-bodied man, had done worse work than Sanders intended, and the
poor girl's arm hung limp and she fainted away.
"Mother of God," muttered Sanders, "I have killed you, Molly darling!"
Her head lay on Fairfax's shoulder. "Let's get her into the coffee
house," he said shortly.
Sanders was horrified at the sight of the girl he adored lying like
death from his blow, and with a determination which Fairfax could not
thwart the engineer took the girl in his own arms.
"Give her to me," he said fiercely, "I'll settle with you later. Can't
take her into the coffee house: they've turned her out on account of
you. There's not a house that would take her but the hotel. I'm going to
carry her to my mother."
Followed by a little group of people whom Fairfax refused to enlighten,
they went down the street, and Sanders disappeared within the door of
the shanty where his family lived.
The incident gave Antony food for thought, and he chewed a bitter cud as
he shut himself into his room. He couldn't help the girl's coming to him
in his illness. He could have sent her about her business the first day
that he was conscious. She would not have gone. She had lost her place
and her reputation, according to Sanders, because of her love for him.
There was not any use in mincing the matter. That's the way it stood.
What should he do? What could he do?
He took off his heavy overcoat and muffler, rubbed his hands, which were
taking on their accustomed dirt and healthy vigour, poured out a glass
of milk from the bottle on his window sill, and drank it, musing. The
Company had acted well to him. The paymaster was a mighty fine man, and
Antony had won his interest long ago. They had advanced him a month's
pay on account of his illness. He brushed his blonde hair meditatively
before the glass, settled the cravat under the low rolling collar of his
flannel shirt. He was a New York Central fireman on regular duty, no
further up the scale than Molly Shannon--as far as Nut Street and the
others knew. Was there any reason why he should not marry her? She had
harmed herself to do him good. He was reading his books on mechanics, a
little later he was going to night school when his hours changed; he was
going to study engineering; he had his yard ambitions, the only ones he
permitted himself to have.
It was four o'clock of the winter afternoon, and the sunset left its red
over the sky. Through his little window he saw the smoke of a locomotive
rise in a milky column, cradle and flow and melt away. The ringing of
the bells, the crying note of the whistles, had become musical to
Fairfax.
There was no reason why he should not marry the Irish girl who doled out
coffee to railroad hands.... Was there none? The figure of his mother
rose before him, beautiful, proud, ambitious Mrs. Fairfax. She was
waiting for his brilliant success, she was waiting to crown him when he
should bring his triumphs home. The ugly yards blurred before his eyes,
he almost fancied that a spray of jasmine blew across the pane.
He would write--
"Mother, I have married an Irish girl, a loving, honest creature who
saved my life and lost her own good name doing so. It was my duty,
mother, wasn't it? I am not striving for name or fame; I don't know what
art means any more. I am a day labourer, a common fireman on an engine
in the Albany yards--that's the truth, mother."
"Good heavens!" He turned brusquely from the window, paced his room a
few times, limping up and down it, the lame jackdaw, the crippled bird
in his cage, and his heart swelled in his breast. No--he could not do
it. The Pride that had led him here and forced him to make his way in
spite of fate, the Pride that kept him here would not let him. He had
ambitions then? He was not then dead to fame? Where were those dreams?
Let them come to him and inspire him now. He recalled the choir-master of
St. Angel's church. He could get a job to sing in St. Angel's if he
pleased. He would run away to Albany. He had run away from New York; now
he would run from Nut Street like a cad and save his Pride. He would
leave the girl with the broken arm, the coffee-house door shut against
her, to shift for herself, because he was a gentleman. Alongside the
window he had hung up his coat and hat, and they recalled to him her
things as they had hung there. There had been something dove-like and
dear in her presence in his room of sickness. His Pride! He could hear
his old Mammy say--
"Massa Tony, chile, you' pride's gwine to lead yo thru black waters some
day, shore."
He said "Come in" to the short, harsh rap at the door, and Sanders
entered, slamming the door behind him. His face was hostile but not
murderous; as usual his bowler was a-cock on his head.
"See here, Fairfax, she sent me. She ain't hurt much, just a damned
nasty bruise. I gave her my promise not to stick a knife into you."
Fairfax pushed up his sleeves; his arms were white as snow. He had lost
flesh.
"I'll fight you right here, Sanders," he said, "and we'll not make a
sound. I'm not as fit as you are, but I'll punish you less for that
reason. Come on."
Molly's lover put his hand in his pockets because he was afraid to leave
them out. He shook his head.
"I gave the girl my word, and I'd rather please Molly than break every
bone in your ---- body, and that's saying a good deal. And here on my
own hook I want to ask you a plain question."
"I shan't answer it, Sandy."
The other with singular patience returned, "All right. I'm going to ask
just the same. Are you ... will you ... what the hell...!" he exclaimed.
"Don't go on," said Fairfax; "shut up and go home."
Instead, Sanders took off his hat, a sign of unusual excitement with
him. He wiped his face and said huskily--
"Ain't got a chance in the world alongside you, Fairfax, and I'd go down
and crawl for her. That's how _I'm_ about her, mate." His face broke up.
Fairfax answered quietly, "That's all right, Sanders--that's all right."
The engineer went on: "I want you to clear out and give me my show,
Tony. I had one before you turned up in Nut Street."
"Why, I can't do that, Sanders," said Fairfax gently; "you oughtn't to
ask a man to do that. Don't you see how it will look to the girl?"
The other man's face whitened; he couldn't believe his ears.
"Why, you don't mean to say...?" he wondered slowly.
The figure under the jasmine vine, the proud form and face of his
mother, grew smaller, paler as does the fading landscape when we look
back upon it from the hill we have climbed.
"The doctor told me Molly had saved my life," Fairfax said. "They have
turned her out of doors in ---- Street. Now you must let me make good as
far as I can."
The young man's blue eyes rested quietly on the blood-shot eyes of his
visitor. Sanders made no direct answer; he bit his moustache,
considered his companion a second, and clapping his hat on his head,
tore the door open.
"You are doing her a worse wrong than any," he stammered; "she ain't
your kind and you don't love her."
His hand whitened in its grip on the door handle, then giving one look
at his companion as though he meditated repeating his unfortunate attack
upon him, he flung himself out of the door, muttering--
"I've got to get out of here.... I don't dare to stay!"