Another Elenor Murray. How she danced
And tripped from place to place--such energy!
She almost wore me out with seeing sights.
But now behold! The White Pass she must see
Upon the principle of missing nothing--
But oh the grave of "Soapy" Smith, the outlaw,
The gambler and the heeler, that for her!
We went four miles and found the cemetery,
The grave of "Soapy" Smith.--Came back to town
Where she would see the buildings where they played
Stud poker, Keno, in the riotous days.
Time came for her to go. She looked at me
And said "Come on to Fairbanks." As for that,
I'd had enough, was ready to return,
But sensed an honorarium, so I said,
"You might induce me," with a pregnant tone.
That moment we were walking 'cross the street,
She stopped a moment, shook from head to heels,
And said, "No man has talked to me that way."
I dropped the matter. She renewed it--said,
"Why do you hurry back? What calls you back?
Come on to Fairbanks, see the gardens there,
That tag the blizzards with their rosy hands
And romp amid the snows." She smiled at me.
Well, then I thought--why not? And smiled her back,
And on we went to Fairbanks, where my hat
Blows off, as I shall tell you.
For a day
We did the town together, and that night
I thought to win her. First we dined together,
Had many drinks, my little school ma'am drank
Of everything I ordered, had a place
For more than I could drink. And truth to tell
At bed time I was woozy, ten o'clock.
We had not registered. And so I said,
"I'm Mr. Kelly and you're Mrs. Kelly."
She shook her head. And so to make an end
I could not win her, signed my name in full;
She did the same, we said good night and parted.
Next morning when I woke, felt none too good,
Got up at last and met her down at breakfast;
Tried eggs and toast, could only drink some coffee;
Got worse; in short, she saw it, put her hand
Upon my head and said, "Your head is hot,
You have a fever." Well, I lolled around
And tried to fight it off till noon--no good.
By this time I was sick, lay down to rest.
By night I could not lift my head--in short,
I lay there for a month, and all the time
She cared for me just like a mother would.
They moved me to a suite, she took the room
That opened into mine, by night and day
She nursed me, cheered me, read to me. At last
When I sat up, was soon to be about,
She said to me, "I'm going on to Nome,
St. Michael first. They tell me that you cross
The Arctic Circle going to St. Michael,
And I must cross the Arctic Circle--think
To come this far and miss it. I must see
The Indian villages." And there again
I saw, but clearer than before, the spirit
Adventuresome and restless, what you call
The heart American. I said to her,
"I'm not too well, I'm lonely,--yes, and more--
I'm fond of you, you have been good to me,
Stay with me here.--She darted in and out
The room where I was lying, doing things,
And broke my pleadings just like icicles
You shoot against a wall.
But here she was,
A month in Fairbanks, living at expense,
Said "I am short of money--lend me some,
I'll go to Nome, return to you and then
We'll ship together for the States."
You see
I really owed her money for her care,
Her loss in staying--then I loved the girl,
Had played all cards but one--I played it now:
"Come back and marry me." Her eyes looked down.
"I will be fair with you," she said, "and think.
Away from you I can make up my mind
If I have love enough to marry you."
I gave her money and she went away,
And for some weeks I had a splendid hell
Of loneliness and longing, you might know,
A stranger in Alaska, here in Fairbanks,
In love besides, and mulling in my mind
Our days and nights upon the steamer _Alice_,
Our ramblings in the Northland.
Weeks went by,
No letter and no girl. I found my health
Was vigorous again. One morning walking
I kicked a twenty dollar gold piece up
Right on the side-walk. Picked it up and said:
"An omen of good luck, a letter soon!
Perhaps this town has something for me!" Well,
I thought I'd get a job to pass the time
While waiting for my girl. I got the job
And here I am to-day; I've flourished here,
Worked to the top in Fairbanks in eight years,
And thus my hat blew off.
What of the girl?
Six weeks or more a letter came from her,
She crossed the Arctic Circle, went to Nome,
Sailed back to 'Frisco where she wrote to me.
Sent all the money back I loaned to her,
And thanked me for the honor I had done her
In asking her in marriage, but had thought
The matter over, could not marry me,
Thought in the circumstances it was useless
To come to Fairbanks, see me, tell me so.
Now, Bill, I'm egotist enough to think
This girl could do no better. Now it seems
She's dead and never married--why not me?
Why did she ditch me? So I thought about it,
Was piqued of course, concluded in the end
There was another man. A woman's no
Means she has someone else, expects to have,
More suited to her fancy. Then one morning
As I awoke with thoughts of her as usual
Right in my mind there plumped an incident
On shipboard when she asked me if I knew
A certain man in Chicago. At the time
The question passed amid our running talk,
And made no memory. But you watch and see
A woman when she asks you if you know
A certain man, the chances are the man
Is something in her life. So now I lay
And thought there is a man, and that's the man;
His name is stored away, I'll dig it up
Out of the cells subliminal--so I thought
But could not bring it back.
I found at last
The telephone directory of Chicago,
And searched and searched the names from A to Z.
Some mornings would pronounce a name and think
That is the name, then throw the name away--
It did not fit the echo in my brain.
But now at last--look here! Eight years are gone,
I'm healed of Elenor Murray, married too;
And read about her death here in the _Times_,
And turn the pages over--column five--
Chicago startled by a suicide--
Gregory Wenner kills himself--behold
The name, at last, she spoke!
* * * * *
So much for waters in Alaska. Now
Turn eyes upon the waters nearer home.
Anton Sosnowski has a fateful day
And Winthrop Marion runs the story down,
And learns Sosnowski read the _Times_ the day,
He broke from brooding to a dreadful deed;
Sosnowski saw the face of Elenor Murray
And Rufus Fox upon the self-same page,
And afterwards was known to show a clipping
Concerning Elenor Murray and the banner
Of Joan of Arc, the words she wrote and folded
Within the banner: to be brave, nor flinch.
ANTON SOSNOWSKI
Anton Sosnowski, from the Shakspeare School
Where he assists the janitor, sweeps and dusts,
The day now done, sits by a smeared up table
Munching coarse bread and drinking beer; before him
The evening paper spread, held down or turned
By claw-like hands, covered with shiny scars.
He broods upon the war news, and his fate
Which keeps him from the war, looks up and sees
His scarred face in the mirror over the wainscot;
His lashless eyes and browless brows and head
With patches of thin hair. And then he mutters
Hot curses to himself and turns the paper
And curses Germany, and asks revenge
For Poland's wrongs.
And what is this he sees?
The picture of his ruin and his hate,
Wert Rufus Fox! This leader of the bar
Is made the counselor of the city, now
The city takes gas, cars and telephones
And runs them for the people. So this man
Grown rich through machinations against the people,
Who fought the people all his life before,
Abettor, aider, thinker for the slickers
Regraters and forestallers and engrossers,
Is now the friend, adviser of the city,
Which he so balked and thwarted, growing rich,
Feared, noted, bowed to for the very treason
For which he is so hated, yet deferred to.
And Anton looks upon the picture, reads
About the great man's ancestry here printed,
And all the great achievements of his life;
Once president of the bar association,
And member of this club and of that club.
Contributor to charities and art,
A founder of a library, a vestryman.
And Anton looks upon the picture, trembles
Before the picture's eyes. They are the eyes
Of Innocent the Tenth, with cruelty
And cunning added--eyes that see all things
And boulder jaws that crush all things--the jaws
That place themselves at front of drifts, are placed
By that world irony which mocks the good,
And gives the glory and the victory
To strength and greed.
Anton Sosnowski looks
Long at the picture, then at his own hands,
And laughs maniacally as he takes the mug
With both hands like a bird with frozen claws,
These broken, burned off hands which handle bread
As they were wooden rakes. And in a mirror
Beside the table in the wall, smeared over
With steam from red-hots, kraut and cookery,
Of smoking fats, fixed by the dust in blurs,
And streaks, he sees his own face, horrible
For scars and splotches as of leprosy;
The eyes that have no lashes and no brows;
The bullet head that has no hair, the ears
Burnt off at top.
So comes it to this Pole
Who sees beside the picture of the lawyer
The clear cut face of Elenor Murray--yes,
She gave her spirit to the war, is dead,
Her life is being sifted now. But Fox
Lives for more honors, and by honors covers
His days of evil.
Thus Sosnowski broods,
And lives again that moment of hell when fire
Burst like a geyser from a vat where gas
Had gathered in his ignorance; being sent
To light a drying stove within the vat,
A work not his, who was the engineer.
The gas exploded as he struck the match,
And like an insect fixed upon a pin
And held before a flame, hands, face and body
Were burned and broken as his body shot
Up and against the brewery wall. What next?
The wearisome and tangled ways of courts
With Rufus Fox for foe, four trials in all
Where juries disagreed who heard the law
Erroneously given by the court.
At last a verdict favorable, and a court
Sitting above the forum where he won
To say, as there's no evidence to show
Just how the gas got in the vat, Sosnowski
Must go for life with broken hands unhelped.
And that the fact alone of gas therein
Though naught to show his fault had brought it there,
The mere explosion did not speak a fault
Against the brewery.
Out from court he went
To use a broom with crumpled hands, and look
For life in mirrors at his ghastly face.
And brood until suspicion grew to truth
That Rufus Fox had compassed juries, courts;
And read of Rufus Fox, who day by day
Was featured in the press for noble deeds,
For Art or Charity, for notable dinners,
Guests, travels and what not.
So now the Pole
Reading of Elenor Murray, cursed himself
That he could brood and wait--for what?--and grow
More weak of will for brooding, while this woman
Had gone to war and served and ended it,
Yet he lived on, and could not go to war;
Saw only days of sweeping with these hands,
And every day his face within the mirror,
And every afternoon this glass of beer,
And coarse bread, and these thoughts.
And every day some story to arouse
His sense of justice; how the generous
Give and pass on, and how the selfish live
And gather honors. But Sosnowski thought
If I could do a flaming thing to show
What courts are ours, what matter if I die?
What if they took their quick-lime and erased
My flesh and bones, expunged my very name,
And made its syllables forbidden?--still
If I brought in a new day for the courts,
Have I not served? he thought. Sosnowski rose
And to the bar, drank whiskey, then went out.
That afternoon Elihu Rufus Fox
Came home to dress for a dinner to be given
For English notables in town--to rest
After a bath, and found himself alone,
His wife at Red Cross work. And there alone,
Collarless, lounging, in a comfort chair,
Poring on Wordsworth's poems--all at once
Before he hears the door turned, rather feels
A foot-fall and a presence, hears too soon
A pistol shot, looks up and sees Sosnowski,
Who fires again, but misses; grabs the man,
Disarms him, flings him down, and finding blood
Upon his shirt sleeve, sees his hand is hit,
No other damage--then the pistol takes,
And covering Sosnowski, looks at him.
And after several seconds gets the face
Which gradually comes forth from memories
Of many cases, knows the man at last.
And studying Sosnowski, Rufus Fox
Divines what drove the fellow to this deed.
And in these moments Rufus Fox beholds
His life and work, and how he made the law
A thing to use, how he had builded friendships
In clubs and churches, courted politicians,
And played with secret powers, and compromised
Causes and truths for power and capital
To draw on as a lawyer, so to win
Favorable judgments when his skill was hired
By those who wished to win, who had to win
To keep the social order undisturbed
And wealth where it was wrenched to.
And Rufus Fox
Knew that this trembling wreck before him knew
About this course of life at making law
And using law, and using those who sit
To administer the law. And then he said:
"Why did you do this?"
And Sosnowski spoke:
"I meant to kill you--where's your right to live
When millions have been killed to make the world
A safer place for liberty? Where's your right
To live and have more honors, be the man
To guide the city, now that telephones,
Gas, railways have been taken by the city?
I meant to kill you just to help the poor
Who go to court. For had I killed you here
My story would be known, no matter if
They buried me in lime, and made my name
A word no man could speak. Now I have failed.
And since you have the pistol, point it at me
And kill me now--for if you tell the world
You killed me in defense of self, the world
Will never doubt you, for the world believes you
And will not doubt your word, whatever it is."
And Rufus Fox replied: "Your mind is turned
For thinking of your case, when you should know
This country is a place of laws, and law
Must have its way, no matter who is hurt.
Now I must turn you over to the courts,
And let you feel the hard hand of the law."
Just then the wife of Rufus Fox came in,
And saw her husband with his granite jaws,
And lowering countenance, blood on his shirt,
The pistol in his hand, the scarred Sosnowski,
Facing the lawyer.
Seeing that her husband
Had no wound but a hand clipped of the skin,
And learning what the story was, she saw
It was no time to let Sosnowski's wrong
Come out to cloud the glory of her husband,
Now that in a new day he had come to stand
With progress, fairer terms of life--to let
The corpse of a dead day be brought beside
The fresh and breathing life of brighter truth.
Quickly she called the butler, gave him charge
Over Sosnowski, who was taken out,
Held in the kitchen, while the two conferred,
The husband and the wife.
To him she said,
They two alone now: "I can see your plan
To turn this fellow over to the law.
It will not do, my dear, it will not do.
For though I have been sharer in your life,
Partaker of its spoils and fruits, I see
This man is just a ghost of a dead day
Of your past life, perhaps, in which I shared.
But that dead life I would not resurrect
In memory even, it has passed us by,
You shall not live it more, no more shall I.
The war has changed the world--the harvest coming
Will have its tares no doubt, but the old tares
Have been cut out and burned, wholly, I trust.
And just to think you used that sharpened talent
For getting money, place, in the old regime,
To place you where to-day? Why, where you must
Use all your talents for the common good.
A barter takes two parties, and the traffic
Whereby the giants of the era gone--
(You are a giant rising on the wreck
Of programs and of plots)--made riches for
Themselves and those they served, is gone as well.
Since gradually no one is left to serve
Or have an interest but the state or city,
The community which is all and should be all.
So here you are at last despite yourself,
Changed not in mind perhaps, but changed in place,
Work, interest, taking pride too in the work;
And speaking with your outer mind, at least
Praise for the day and work.
I am at fault,
And take no virtue to myself--I lived
Your life with you and coveted the things
Your labors brought me. All is changed for me.
I would be poorer than this wretched Pole
Rather than go back to the day that's dead,
Or reassume the moods I lived them through.
What can we do now to undo the past,
Those days of self-indulgence, ostentation,
False prestige, witless pride, that waste of time,
Money and spirit, haunted by ennui
Insatiable emotion, thirst for change.
At least we can do this: We can set up
The race's progress and our country's glory
As standards for our work each day, go on
Perhaps in ignorance, misguided faith;
And let the end approve our poor attempts.
Now to begin, I ask two things of you:
If you or anyone who did your will
Wronged this poor Pole, make good the wrong at once.
And for the sake of bigness let him go.
For your own name's sake, let the fellow go.
Do you so promise me?"
And Rufus Fox,
Who looked a thunder cloud of wrath and power
Before the mirror tying his white tie,
All this time silent--only spoke these words:
"Go tell the butler to keep guard on him
And hold him till we come from dinner."
The wife
Looked at the red black face of Rufus Fox
There in the mirror, which like Lao's mirror
Reflected what his mind was, then went out
Gently to her bidding, found Sosnowski
Laughing and talking with the second maid,
Watched over by the butler, quite himself,
His pent up anger half discharged, his grudge
In part relieved.
There was a garrulous ancient at LeRoy
Who traced all evils to monopoly
In land, all social cures to single tax.
He tried to button-hole the coroner
And tell him what he thought of Elenor Murray.
But Merival escaped. And then this man,
Consider Freeland named, got in a group
And talked his mind out of the case, the land
And what makes poverty and waste in lives:
CONSIDER FREELAND
Look at that tract of land there--five good acres
Held out of use these thirty years and more.
They keep a cow there. See! the cow's there now.
She can't eat up the grass, there is so much.
And in these thirty years these houses here,
Here, all around here have been built. This lot
Is worth five times the worth it had before
These houses were built round it.
Well, by God,
I am in part responsible for this.
I started out to be a first rate lawyer.
Was I first rate lawyer? Well, I won
These acres for the Burtons in the day
When I could tell you what is gavel kind,
Advowsons, corodies, frank tenements,
Scutage, escheats, feoffments, heriots,
Remainders and reversions, and mortmain,
Tale special and tale general, tale female,
Fees absolute, conditional, copyholds;
And used to stand and argue with the courts
The difference 'twixt a purchase, limitation,
The rule in Shelley's case.
And so it was
In my good days I won these acres here
For old man Kingston's daughter, who in turn
Bound it with limitation for the life
Of selfish sons, who keep a caretaker,
Who keeps a cow upon it. There's the cow!
The land has had no use for thirty years.
The children are kept off it. Elenor Murray,
This girl whose death makes such a stir, one time
Was playing there--but that's another story.
I only say for the present, these five acres
Made Elenor Murray's life a thing of waste
As much as anything, and a damn sight more.
For think a minute!
Kingston had a daughter
Married to Colonel Burton in Kentucky.
And Kingston's son was in the Civil War.
But just before the war, the Burtons deeded
These acres here, which she inherited
From old man Kingston, to this Captain Kingston,
The son aforesaid of Old Kingston. Well,
The deed upon its face was absolute,
But really was a deed in trust.
The Captain
Held title for a year or two, and then
An hour before he fought at Shiloh, made
A will, and willed acres to his wife,
Fee simple and forever. Now you'd think
That contemplating death, he'd make a deed
Giving these acres back to Mrs. Burton,
The sister who had trusted him. I don't know
What comes in people's heads, but I believe
The want of money is the root of evil,
As well as love of money; for this Captain
Perhaps would make provision for his wife
And infant son, thought that the chiefest thing
No matter how he did it, being poor,
Willed this land as he did. But anyway
He willed it so, went into Shiloh's battle,
And fell dead on the field.
What happened then?
They took this will to probate. As I said
I was a lawyer then, you may believe it,
Was hired by the Burtons to reclaim
These acres from the Widow Kingston's clutch,
Under this wicked will. And so I argued
The will had not been witnessed according to law.
Got beat upon that point in the lower court,
But won upon it in the upper courts.
Then next I filed a bill to set aside
This deed the Burtons made to Captain Kingston--
Oh, I was full of schemes, expedients,
In those days, I can tell you. Widow Kingston
Came back and filed a cross bill, asked the court
To confirm the title in her son and her
As heirs of Captain Kingston, let the will
Go out of thought and reckoning. Here's the issue;
You understand the case, no doubt. We fought
Through all the courts. I lost in the lower court,
As I lost on the will. There was the deed:
For love and affection and one dollar we
Convey and warrant lots from one to ten
In the city of LeRoy, to Captain Kingston
To be his own forever.
How to go
Behind such words and show the actual trust
Inhering in the deed, that was the job.
But here I was resourceful as before,
Found witnesses to testify they heard
This Captain Kingston say he held the acres
In trust for Mrs. Burton--but I lost
Before the chancellor, had to appeal,
But won on the appeal, and thus restored
These acres to the Burtons. And for this
What did I get? Three hundred lousy dollars.
That's why I smoke a pipe; that's also why
I quit the business when I saw the business
Was making ready to quit me. By God,
My life is waste so far as it was used
By this law business, and no coroner
Need hold an inquest on me to find out
What waste was in my life--God damn the law!
Well, then I go my way, and take my fee,
And pay my bills. The Burtons have the land,
And turn a cow upon it. See how nice
A playground it would be. I've seen ten sets
Of children try to play there--hey! you hear,
The caretaker come out, get off of there!
And then the children scamper, climb the fence.
Well, after while the Burtons die. The will
Leaves these five acres to their sons for life,
Remainder to the children of the sons.
The sons are living yet at middle life,
These acres have been tied up twenty years,
They may be tied up thirty years beside:
The sons can't sell it, and their children can't,
Only the cow can use it, as it stands.
It grows more valuable as the people come here,
And bring in being Elenor Murrays, children,
And make the land around it populous.
That's what makes poverty, this holding land,
It makes the taxes harder on the poor,
It makes work scarcer, and it takes your girls
And boys and throws them into life half made,
Half ready for the battle. Is a country
Free where the laws permit such things? Your priests,
Your addle-headed preachers mouthing Christ
And morals, prohibition, laws to force
People to be good, to save the girls,
When every half-wit knows environment
Takes natures, made unstable in these homes
Of poverty and does the trick.
That baronet
Who mocked our freedom, sailing back for England
And said: Your Liberty Statue in the harbor
Is just a joke, that baronet is right,
While such conditions thrive.
Well, look at me
Who for three hundred dollars take a part
In making a cow pasture for a cow
For fifty years or so. I hate myself.
And were the Burtons better than this Kingston?
Kingston would will away what was not his.
The Burtons took what is the gift of God,
As much as air, and fenced it out of use--
Save for the cow aforesaid--for the lives
Of sons in being.
Oh, I know you think
I have a grudge. I have.