NORTH DOOR AND SOUTH DOOR
For Samuel Appleby to pay a visit to Daniel Wheeler was of itself an
astounding occurrence. The two men had not seen each other since the day,
fifteen years ago, when Governor Appleby had pardoned the convicted
Wheeler, with a condition, which, though harsh, had been strictly adhered
to.
They had never been friends at heart, for they were diametrically opposed
in their political views, and were not of similar tastes or pursuits. But
they had been thrown much together, and when the time came for Wheeler to
be tried for forgery, Appleby lent no assistance to the case. However,
through certain influences brought to bear, in connection with the fact
that Mrs. Wheeler was related to the Applebys, the governor pardoned the
condemned man, with a conditional pardon.
Separated ever since, a few letters had passed between the two men, but
they resulted in no change of conditions.
As the big car ran southward through the Berkshire Hills, Appleby’s
thoughts were all on the coming meeting, and the scenery of autumn
foliage that provoked wild exclamations of delight from Genevieve and
assenting enthusiasm from Keefe left the other unmoved.
An appreciative nod and grunt were all he vouchsafed to the girl’s
gushing praises, and when at last they neared their destination he called
her attention to a tall old sycamore tree standing alone on a ridge not
far away.
“That’s the tree that gives the Wheeler place its name,” he informed.
“Sycamore Ridge is one of the most beautiful places in Connecticut.”
“Oh, are we in Connecticut?” asked Miss Lane. “I didn’t know we had
crossed the border. What a great old tree! Surely one of the historic
trees of New England, isn’t it?”
“Historic to the Wheelers,” was the grim reply, and then Mr. Appleby
again relapsed into silence and spoke no further word until they reached
the Wheeler home.
A finely curved sweep of driveway brought them to the house, and the car
stopped at the south entrance.
The door did not swing open in welcome, and Mr. Appleby ordered his
chauffeur to ring the bell.
This brought a servant in response, and the visiting trio entered the
house.
It was long and low, with many rooms on either side of the wide hall that
went straight through from south to north. The first room to the right
was a large living-room, and into this the guests were shown and were met
by a grave-looking man, who neither smiled nor offered a hand as his calm
gaze rested on Samuel Appleby.
Indeed, the two men stared at one another, in undisguised curiosity. Each
seemed to search the other’s face for information as to his attitude and
intent.
“Well, Dan,” Appleby said, after the silent scrutiny, “you’ve changed
some, but you’re the same good-looking chap you always were.”
Wheeler gave a start and pulled himself together.
“Thank you. I suppose I should return the compliment.”
“But you can’t conscientiously do it, eh?” Appleby laughed. “Never mind.
Personal vanity is not my besetting sin. This is my secretary, Mr. Keefe,
and my assistant, Miss Lane.”
“Ah, yes, yes. How are you? How do you do? My wife and daughter will look
after the young lady. Maida!”
As if awaiting the call, a girl came quickly in from the hall followed by
an older woman. Introductions followed, and if there was an air of
constraint on the part of the host the ladies of the family showed none.
Sunny-faced Maida Wheeler, with her laughing brown eyes and gold brown
hair, greeted the visitors with charming cordiality, and her mother was
equally kind and courteous.
Genevieve Lane’s wise and appraising eyes missed no point of appearance
or behavior.
“Perfect darlings, both of them!” she commented to herself. “Whatever
ails the old guy, it hasn’t bitten them. Or else—wait a minute——”
Genevieve was very observant—“perhaps they’re putting on a little. Is
their welcome a bit extra, to help things along?”
Yet only a most meticulous critic could discern anything more than true
hospitality in the attitude of Mrs. Wheeler or Maida. The latter took
Genevieve to the room prepared for her and chatted away in girlish
fashion.
“The place is so wonderful!” Genevieve exclaimed, carefully avoiding
personal talk. “Don’t you just adore it?”
“Oh, yes. I’ve loved Sycamore Ridge for nearly fifteen years.”
“Have you lived here so long?” Genevieve was alert for information. It
was fifteen years ago that the pardon had been granted.
But as Maida merely assented and then changed the subject, Miss Lane was
far too canny to ask further questions.
With a promptness not entirely due to chance, the stenographer came
downstairs dressed for dinner some several minutes before the appointed
hour. Assuming her right as a guest, she wandered about the rooms.
The south door, by which they had entered, was evidently the main
entrance, but the opposite, or north door, gave on to an even more
beautiful view, and she stepped out on the wide veranda and gazed
admiringly about. The low ridge nearby formed the western horizon, and
the giant sycamore, its straight branches outlined against the fading
sunset, was impressive and a little weird. She strolled on, and turned
the corner the better to see the ridge. The veranda ran all round the
house, and as she went on along the western side, she suddenly became
aware of a silent figure leaning against a pillar at the southwest
corner.
“It is so quiet it frightens me,” she said to Daniel Wheeler, as she
neared him.
“Do you feel that way, too?” he asked, looking at her a little absently.
“It is the lull before the storm.”
“Oh, that sunset doesn’t mean rain,” Genevieve exclaimed, smiling,
“unless your Connecticut blue laws interpret weather signs differently
from our Massachusetts prophets. We _are_ in Connecticut, aren’t we?”
“Yes,” and Wheeler sighed unaccountably. “Yes, Miss Lane, we are. That
sycamore is the finest tree in the state.”
“I can well believe it. I never saw such a grandfather of a tree! It’s
all full of little balls.”
“Yes, buttonballs, they are called. But note its wonderful symmetry, its
majestic appearance——”
“And strength! It looks as if it would stand, there forever!”
“Do you think so?” and the unmistakable note of disappointment in the
man’s tone caused Genevieve to look up in astonishment. “Well, perhaps it
will,” he added quickly.
“Oh, no, of course it won’t really! No tree stands forever. But it will
be here long after you and I are gone.”
“Are you an authority on trees?” Wheeler spoke without a smile.
“Hardly that; but I was brought up in the country, and I know something
of them. Your daughter loves the country, too.”
“Oh, yes—we all do.”
The tone was courteous, but the whole air of the man was so melancholy,
his cheerfulness so palpably assumed, that Genevieve felt sorry for him,
as well as inordinately curious to know what was the matter.
But her sympathy was the stronger impulse, and with a desire to entertain
him, she said, “Come for a few steps in the garden, Mr. Wheeler, won’t
you? Come and show me that quaint little summer-house near the front
door. It is the front door, isn’t it? It’s hard to tell.”
“Yes, the north door _is_ the front door,” Wheeler said slowly, as if
repeating a lesson. “The summer-house you mention is near the front door.
But we won’t visit that now. Come this other way, and I’ll show you a
Japanese tea-house, much more attractive.”
But Genevieve Lane was sometimes under the spell of the Imp of the
Perverse.
“No, no,” she begged, smilingly, “let the Japanese contraption wait;
please go to the little summer-house now. See, how it fairly twinkles in
the last gleams of the setting sun! What is the flower that rambles all
over it? Oh, do let’s go there now! Come, please!”
With no reason for her foolish insistence save a whim, Genevieve was
amazed to see the look of fury that came over her host’s face.
“Appleby put you up to that!” he cried, in a voice of intense anger. “He
told you to ask me to go to that place!”
“Why, Mr. Wheeler,” cried the girl, almost frightened, “Mr. Appleby did
nothing of the sort! Why should he! I’m not asking anything wrong, am I?
Why is it so dreadful to want to see an arbor instead of a tea-house? You
must be crazy!”
When Miss Lane was excited, she was quite apt to lose her head, and speak
in thoughtless fashion.
But Mr. Wheeler didn’t seem to notice her informality of speech. He only
stared at her as if he couldn’t quite make her out, and then he suddenly
seemed to lose interest in her or her wishes, and with a deep sigh, he
turned away, and fell into the same brooding posture as when she had
first approached him.
“Come to dinner, people,” called Maida’s pretty voice, as, with
outstretched hands she came toward them. “Why, dads, what are you looking
miserable about? What have you done to him, Miss Lane?”
“Maida, child, don’t speak like that! Miss Lane has been most kindly
talking to me, of—of the beauties of Sycamore Ridge.”
“All right, then, and forgive me, Miss Lane. But you see, the sun rises
and sets for me in one Daniel Wheeler, Esquire, and any shadow on his
face makes me apprehensive of its cause.”
Only for an instant did Genevieve Lane’s sense of justice rise in revolt,
then her common sense showed her the better way, and she smiled
pleasantly and returned:
“I don’t blame you, Miss Wheeler. If I had a father, I should feel just
the same way, I know. But don’t do any gory-lock-shaking my way. I assure
you I didn’t really scold him. I only kicked because he wouldn’t humor my
whim for visiting the summer-house with the blossoms trailing over it!
Was that naughty of me?”
But though Genevieve listened for the answer, none came.
“Come on in to dinner, daddy, dear,” Maida repeated. “Come, Miss Lane,
they’re waiting for us.”
Dinner was a delightful occasion.
Daniel Wheeler, at the head of his own table, was a charming host, and
his melancholy entirely disappeared as the talk ran along on subjects
grave or gay, but of no personal import.
Appleby, too, was entertaining, and the two men, with Mrs. Wheeler,
carried on most of the conversation, the younger members of the party
being by what seemed common consent left out of it.
Genevieve looked about the dining-room, with a pleased interest. She
dearly loved beautiful appointments and was really imagining herself
mistress of just such a house, and visioning herself at the head of such
a table. The long room stretched from north to south, parallel with the
hall, though not adjoining. The table was not in the centre, but toward
the southern end, and Mr. Wheeler, at the end near the windows, had Keefe
and Miss Lane on either side of him.
Appleby, as guest of honor, sat at Mrs. Wheeler’s right, and the whole
effect was that of a formal dinner party, rather than a group of which
two were merely office employés.
“It is one of the few remaining warm evenings,” said Mrs. Wheeler, as she
rose from the table, “we will have our coffee on the veranda. Soon it
will be too cool for that.”
“Which veranda?” asked Genevieve of Maida, as they went through the hall.
“The north one, I hope.”
“Your hopes must be dashed,” laughed the other, “for it will be the south
one. Come along.”
The two girls, followed by Keefe, took possession of a group of chairs
near Mrs. Wheeler, while the two older men sat apart, and soon became
engrossed in their own discussions.
Nor was it long before Samuel Appleby and his host withdrew to a room
which opened on to that same south veranda, and which was, in fact, Mr.
Wheeler’s den.
“Well, Sam,” Keefe heard the other say, as he drew down the blind, “we
may as well have it out now. What are you here for?”
Outwardly placid, but almost consumed with curiosity, Curt Keefe changed
his seat for one nearer the window of the den. He hoped to hear the
discussion going on inside, but was doomed to disappointment, for though
the murmuring of the voices was audible, the words were not distinct, and
Keefe gathered only enough information to be sure that there was a heated
argument in progress and that neither party to it was inclined to give in
a single point.
Of course, he decided, the subject was the coming election campaign, but
the details of desired bargaining he could not gather.
Moreover, often, just as he almost heard sentences of interest, the
chatter of the girls or some remark of Mrs. Wheeler’s would drown the
voices of the men in the room.
One time, indeed, he heard clearly: “When the Sycamore on the ridge goes
into Massachusetts——” but this was sheer nonsense, and he concluded he
must have misunderstood.
Later, they all forgathered in the living-room and there was music and
general conversation.
Genevieve Lane proved herself decidedly entertaining, and though Samuel
Appleby looked a little amusedly at his stenographer, he smiled kindly at
her as he noticed that she in no way overstepped the bounds of correct
demeanor.
Genevieve was thinking of what Keefe had said to her: “If you do only
what is absolutely correct and say what is only absolutely correct, you
can do whatever you like.”
She had called it nonsense at the time, but she was beginning to see the
truth of it. She was careful that her every word and act should be
correct, and she was most decidedly doing as she liked. She made good
with Mrs. Wheeler and Maida with no trouble at all; but she felt,
vaguely, that Mr. Wheeler didn’t like her. This she set about to remedy.
Going to his side, as he chanced to sit for a moment alone, she smiled
ingratiatingly and said:
“I wonder if you can imagine, sir, what it means to me to see the inside
of a house like this?”
“Bless my soul, what do you mean?” asked Wheeler, puzzled at the girl’s
manner.
“It’s like a glimpse of Fairyland,” she went on. “You see, I’m terribly
ambitious—oh, fearfully so! And all my ambitions lead to just this sort
of a home. Do you suppose I’ll ever achieve it, Mr. Wheeler?”
Now the girl had truly wonderful magnetic charm, and even staid old Dan
Wheeler was not insensible to the note of longing in her voice, the
simple, honest admission of her hopes.
“Of course you will, little one,” he returned, kindly. “I’ve heard that
whatever one wants, one gets, provided the wish is strong enough.” He
spoke directly to her, but his gaze wandered as if his thoughts were far
away.
“Do you really believe that?” Genevieve’s big blue eyes begged an
affirmation.
“I didn’t say I believed it—I said I have heard it.” He smiled sadly.
“Not quite the same—so far as I’m concerned; but quite as assuring to
you. Of course, my belief wouldn’t endorse the possibility.”
“It would for me,” declared Genevieve. “I’ve lots of confidence in other
people’s opinions——”
“Anybody’s?”
“Anybody whom I respect and believe in.”
“Appleby, for instance?”
“Oh, yes, indeed! I’d trust Mr. Appleby’s opinions on any subject. Let’s
go over there and tell him so.”
Samuel Appleby was sitting at the other end, the north end of the long
room. “No,” said Wheeler, “I’m too comfortable here to move—ask him to
come here.”
Genevieve looked at him a little astonished. It was out of order, she
thought, for a host to speak thus. She pressed the point, saying there
was a picture at the other end of the room she wished to examine.
“Run along, then,” said Wheeler, coolly. “Here, Maida, show Miss Lane
that etching and tell her the interesting details about it.”
The girls went away, and soon after Keefe drifted round to Wheeler’s
side.
“You know young Sam Appleby?” he asked, casually.
“No,” Wheeler said, shortly but not sharply. “I daresay he’s a most
estimable chap.”
“He’s all of that. He’s a true chip of the old block. Both good
gubernatorial timber, as I’m sure you agree.”
“What makes you so sure, Mr. Keefe?”
Curt Keefe looked straight at him. “Well,” he laughed, “I’m quite ready
to admit that the wish was father to the thought.”
“Why do you call that an admission?”
“Oh,” Keefe readily returned, “it is usually looked upon as a confession
that one has no reason for a thought other than a wish.”
“And why is it your wish?”
“Because it is the wish of my employer,” said Keefe, seriously. “I know
of no reason, Mr. Wheeler, why I shouldn’t say that I hope and trust you
will use your influence to further the cause of young Appleby.”
“What makes you think I can do so?”
“While I am not entirely in Mr. Appleby’s confidence, he has told me that
the campaign would be greatly aided by your willingness to help, and so I
can’t help hoping you will exercise it.”
“Appleby has told you so much, has he? No more?”
“No more, I think, regarding yourself, sir. I know, naturally, the
details of the campaign so far as it is yet mapped out.”
“And you know why I do not want to lend my aid?”
“I know you are not in accordance with the principles of the Appleby
politics——”
“That I am not! Nor shall I ever be. Nor shall I ever pretend to be——”
“Pretend? Of course not. But could you not be persuaded?”
“By what means?”
“I don’t know, Mr. Wheeler,” and Keefe looked at him frankly. “I truly
don’t know by what means. But I do know that Mr. Appleby is here to
present to you an argument by which he hopes to persuade you to help
young Sam along—and I earnestly desire to add any word of mine that may
help influence your decision. That is why I want to tell you of the good
traits of Sam Appleby, junior. It may be I can give you a clearer light
on his character than his father could do——that is, I might present it as
the opinion of a friend——”
“And not exaggerate his virtues as a father might do? I see. Well, Mr.
Keefe, I appreciate your attitude, but let me tell you this: whatever I
do or don’t do regarding this coming campaign of young Appleby will be
entirely irrespective of the character or personality of that young man.
It will all depend on the senior Appleby’s arrangements with me, and my
ability to change his views on some of the more important planks in his
platform. If he directed you to speak to me as you have done, you may
return that to him as my answer.”
“You, doubtless, said the same to him, sir?”
“Of course I did. I make no secret of my position in this matter. Samuel
Appleby has a hold over me—I admit that—but it is not strong enough to
make me forget my ideas of right and wrong to the public. No influence of
a personal nature should weigh against any man’s duty to the state, and I
will never agree to pretend to any dissimulation in order to bring about
a happier life for myself.”
“But need you subscribe to the objectionable points to use your influence
for young Sam?”
“Tacitly, of course. And I do not choose even to appear to agree to
principles abhorrent to my sense of justice and honesty, thereby secretly
gaining something for myself.”
“Meaning your full pardon?”
Wheeler turned a look of surprise on the speaker.
“I thought you said you hadn’t Appleby’s full confidence,” he said.
“Nor have I. I do know—as do many men—that you were pardoned with a
condition, but the condition I do not know. It can’t be very galling.”
And Keefe looked about on the pleasant surroundings.
“You think not? That’s because you don’t know the terms. And yet, galling
though they are, hateful though it makes my life, and the lives of my
wife and daughter, we would all rather bear it than to deviate one iota
from the path of strict right.”
“I must admire you for that, as must any honorable man. But are there not
degrees or shadings of right and wrong——”
“Mr. Keefe, as an old man, I take the privilege of advising you for your
own good. All through your life I beg you remember this: Anyone who
admits degrees or shadings of right or wrong—is already wrong. Don’t be
offended; you didn’t claim those things, you merely asked the question.
But, remember what I said about it.”