THEY WHO WATER WITH TEARS
I
As at last the news of John Rawn's collapse broke full and
fair--disastrous enough to please even his late warmest friends. The
stock markets, East and West, became scenes of riot. The truth, of
course, had leaked out regarding Rawn's fight in the last ditch. The
newspapers swarmed upon Graystone Hall, besieging any who could be
found. Halsey refused to talk, and moreover, Rawn could not be found.
This threw them upon their own resources, and what they did not know
they imagined. Even thus, the wildest of them all could not imagine
half; the shrewdest of the journalists could not get their hands on the
"inside story" here. No one in or around or back of the stock
exchanges could be found possessed of secret information which he was
willing to impart. Throughout wild hours of hurrying, telegraphing,
investigating, the papers kept up their frenzied search for the truth,
and found it not, and knew they had not found it.
Halsey, one morning after a sleepless night, more than a week after
Rawn's departure to New York, secured copies of each of the morning
papers. He stood uncertain, in the great central room of Graystone
Hall, with these black and frowning messengers of fate in his hands,
scarce daring to look at them. He felt some sense of definite disaster
at hand. He glanced at last at one, and started as though struck.
Calling a servant, he sent word to Mrs. Rawn inquiring if he might meet
her at once.
She joined him presently, smiling faintly, giving him her hand, then
leading him to a breakfast table on the long gallery facing the lake
front, a favorite spot with her. She gave the butler orders to serve
them breakfast here at once; for she now learned Halsey had neither
slept nor eaten. Halsey did not learn that the same also was true of
her.
II
They seated themselves and for the time said nothing, each gazing out
over the lake. The morning was calm and beautiful. The blue lake,
just dotted with little whitecap rolling waves, seemed in amiable mood,
and purred gently along the sea-wall, below the green and curving
terrace which ran down from the gallery front. A bird chirped here and
there.
Little enough the peaceful scene reflected the feelings of these, its
only human figures. Virginia Rawn was pale. Dark rings showed below
her eyes. Her mouth drooped just a trifle, plaintively, in a way not
usual with her. She was pale, paler than her usual clean and clear
ivory. Yet she was coolly beautiful in her morning gown of light
figured lawn, with its wide, flowing sleeves, showing her round white
arms. Halsey, frowningly serious, felt the charm of her rise about
him, overwhelm him. He knew that the hour had come for him in more
ways than one; that hers, for ever, was the one face and figure and
voice and presence for him, hopeless and unhappy, and doomed for ever
so to remain. She was not his wife. She was the wife of another
man--of his enemy; the man in all the world least like himself; the man
who, by virtue of that unlikeness, had won this woman for his own.
What hope for him, Charles Halsey, for whom was no place in the world?
III
Without much comment he placed before her the morning papers, with
their glaring head-lines.
"Well," said he, "it is the end."
"Yes?" said she, smiling; "I suppose now we can learn all about our
earlier life and career?"
"Quite so. Here is the entire history of Mr. Rawn's career--what he
did when he was a young man, where he came from, how he rose to power,
how he failed and fell--it's all here. Here's the story of the
International Power Company--they claim it was intended as a merger of
all the traction companies of the eight leading cities of the country!
Bond issue one to eight billion dollars, capitalization one to two
hundred billion in stocks--you can take your choice in crazed figures.
Here are biographical histories of all the known and unknown
stock-holders. Here, Mrs. Rawn, is a picture of yourself, as well as
one of Mr. Rawn and one more of the house here--a new view, I think.
The photographer must have made a flashlight of the grounds."
She smiled as he tried to jest, following his pointing finger along the
blurred, brutal head-lines, shrieking their discordant, impossible and
inconsistent tales. The first paper, the _Forum_, declared the ruin of
John Rawn's fortune to be now beyond all hope of repair. Rawn
himself--really at that time often in a helpless stupor in a New York
hotel room--was reported to have fled the country. Halsey, his
son-in-law, and Halsey's wife, who really had only denied themselves to
visitors and reporters--were declared to be in hiding in some secret
apartments of the great castle on the North Shore, a place actually but
little known to any member of the select North Side society in which
Rawn had been, more or less on sufferance, received. Rawn's wife was
also located here, in a condition verging on insanity; according to the
imagination of the writers, which, after all, was fatefully near to the
truth.
Virginia Rawn smiled, and turned the pages. The next journal had
little else but detailed discussion of the Rawn collapse. It also
asserted the scheme of the International Power Company was the most
bold and rapacious fraud of the day. With journalistic vaticination it
insouciantly declared that the intention of the company was to
establish central distributing points for power stolen from the
public's great water powers, and the retail of what the journal in the
argot of the day called canned power, in cheap and portable small
motors applicable to countless semi-mechanical uses, all with an end of
abolishing the need for horse power and for man power alike. The
result, it pointed out, would be the throwing out of work of countless
thousands of laboring men by the use of electricity stolen from the
people themselves. The gigantic combination already was covering the
main water powers. The people's present openly had been disregarded,
the people's future openly and patently had been put in the gravest of
peril. The entire system of government had been laid by the heels.
The name of the republic had been made a mockery. Above all, it was
asserted, the most intimate intent of the International Power Company
had been the throttling of the labor unions--against which John Rawn
was known to be personally bitterly opposed--the very essence and soul
of the conspiracy having been this device whose aim was to wipe out the
need of unskilled labor, and to make useless and unpaid the power of
human brawn.
IV
Following these assertions--which after all were not in the least bad
journalism, however good or bad had been the design of International
Power--the same journal exultantly declared that labor need not yet
despair, for that the gigantic conspiracy now had fallen in ruins; its
leader had abdicated and fled, and his ill-gotten gains had been
dissipated in his last desperate attempt to save his holdings in other
stocks. In his ultimate fight he had surrendered the control of the
International, so long and desperately held in his ownership, and now
was ousted from the presidency, other managers being left in charge of
the wreck of a desperate marauder's attempt to throttle a republic and
to rule a country. And so forth, to many extra pages, all deliciously
explicit, and wondrous welcome alike to those who purchase and those
who purvey the news.
The chronicle of all this was accompanied in this journal not only with
pictures of Graystone Hall, but of the abandoned factory of the
International Power Company; also with portraits of Rawn and his wife
and of Charles Halsey, late superintendent of the company; as well as
those of Jim Sullivan, the foreman, Ann Sullivan, his wife, and other
labor leaders sometimes concerned about the mysterious factory which
had housed the desperate secret of International Power. As it chanced,
the portraits of Ann Sullivan and Virginia Rawn had been exchanged, so
that the beautiful Mrs. Rawn appeared as a hard-featured Irish woman of
more than middle age; whereas Mrs. Sullivan, wife of the well-known
labor leader, presented a somewhat distinguished figure in her
eminently handsome gown and obviously valuable jewels.
V
Virginia Rawn looked calmly, smilingly, over these and many other
varying details of these closing scenes in her career. "Very well,"
said she, pointing to the likeness accredited to her name, "this is the
last time my portrait will appear in print, I suppose. What difference
does it make? The older and uglier I am, the better the story!
Perhaps for once Mrs. Sullivan, when she sees her picture--young, rich,
with plenty of jewels--will think her dreams have come true! Maybe
she's dreamed--I know I did; and I know what I am. The names and
pictures are right, just as they are. She wins, not I.
"But yes, I suppose this is the end of it all, as you say," she added
wearily, almost indifferently. "Of course, we've known it was coming.
I suppose there was nothing else _could_ come of it all."
Halsey at first could make no answer except to drop his face in his
hands. A half groan escaped him, in spite of his attempt to rival her
courage or her indifference, whichever it might be.
"_I've_ done this," he said at last; "_I've_ brought all this on you.
It's all my fault, and it's too late now for me to help it. We
couldn't straighten out things in the business now, even if I went back
to work. It's too late. I've ruined you, Mrs. Rawn."
"Yes, that's plain," she answered quietly. "But isn't this just what
you wanted? Haven't you always resented the success of others,
deprecated the wish of some men to get money at any cost? Aren't you a
Socialist at heart? Didn't you want this--just this?"
"Want it? No! How could I want anything which meant harm for _you_?
If only you had come to me and asked me to go back--asked me to get
into line!"
"You'd have done it, wouldn't you, Charley--for me?" She smiled at
him, her small, white teeth showing. But back of her smile he felt the
pulse of a mind.
"I don't know--how could I have helped it?"
"Then you'd have forgotten all your loyalty to those people over there?
You'd have forgotten all about the rights of man of which you told me,
and your devotion to the principles of this republic of which you
talked--is that true? You'd have forgotten all, everything, for _me_?"
VI
"Yes, I would!" He looked her fair in the eye, truthfully. "I know
that, now--I didn't know it then, but I do now. Yes, I would. Just as
I told him--Mr. Rawn."
"You told him, what?"
"Why, that we all have our price. I suppose I had mine."
"So you'd have done that if I had asked you?"
"Then in God's name why did you not ask me? At least, I'd have saved
you _this_!" He smote on the paper with his clenched fist. "Why
didn't you ask me to save you this humiliation?"
"I did not, because I knew all along what you'd do if I did ask you."
Silence fell between them now. "Why didn't you?" he once more
demanded, half-whispering. "You'd already won. You'd have won me--my
principles--my honor."
"Because I did not _want to win_!" she answered sharply.
"Win what?"
"I was sent to bring you into camp, to 'get' you, Charley. I did not
want to--I did not! I was afraid I _would_!"
"I don't think I quite understand."
His face was white, his voice low and clear, his eye full on hers.
"I was sent out for you, Charley--by my own husband! You know it, we
both knew it. I suppose he's been waiting somewhere for me to get word
to him that I had done what I was told to do--that I had got you in
hand, willing to renounce everything that you held good in your own
life. Well, it's too late, now! I'm glad!"
"He sent you out after me!--With what restrictions--?"
"None. He didn't care how. He told me he didn't. That's why I've
been keeping away from you. I was afraid I'd win--I was afraid I'd
save all this."
She nodded her head, including the splendors of the mansion house, its
view of the lake, all the gracious, delicate ministries of Wealth.
VII
"Good God!" Halsey broke out. "The man who would do that is not worth
a woman's second thought."
"Of course not. And the woman who would do that--?"
"Don't ask me about that; I can't think. All I know is that if you had
asked me to do anything in the world, I think I'd have said yes."
"For me?"
"Yes, for you. It's the truth. It's all out, at last! There's the
whole story now of John Rawn--all of it, in black and white! Here's
all _my_ story--to you. You must have known--"
"Yes," she nodded; "of course. That was why, I said, that I've evaded
you so long. It was very hard to do, Charley; a hundred times I've
been on the point of sending for you. But I didn't."
"I'm glad, too," he said simply, seeing it was to be soul facing soul,
between them now. "I've missed you. I've never passed such days in my
life as I have here. There's Grace hating me, you ought to hate me--I
ought to hate you! Oh, Rawn, man! Where would you have stopped, to
get money, to get power? Oh, excellent!--to set your wife as a trap
for another man! But it worked! It could have been done!" He looked
her frankly in the face as he finished. "I love you, Virginia," he
said simply. "I suppose I have all along. It's cheap, after all--at
this price. But for all this, I never could have told you.
"But one thing I will say,"--the unhappy young man added, after a long
time; "it's the one thing I can claim for an excuse. _My_ price was
love for you, and _good_ love. It was the whole love of man for
woman--I never knew before what that meant! It wasn't for money, but
for you. That great, mysterious second current--what you yourself said
was the one vast power of all the universe--that belonged to
_everybody_--love--love--I thought _that_ belonged to me, too. I can't
see even now where that is wrong. I can't think, I don't know. If it
is wrong, then I've been wrong. We're down in the mire together! I
dragged you there. And once I dreamed of doing something to lift
people up--that was why I mutinied and tore up the motors. And I had
my own selfish price.... I can never lift up my head again. But I
love you!"
VIII
She looked at him, her lips parted, her bosom agitated now, her eyes
large, her color slowly increasing. "You must not!--Stop, we must
think! Charley--"
"But why didn't you?" he demanded fiercely. "Why didn't you finish
your work as you promised?"
"I never promised. I didn't finish it--because I knew I _could_. I
told you--it was--Charley--yes--it was--love!"
"For me?"
He half started up now, but she raised a hand to restrain him.
"The servants!" she whispered. Indeed, even as she spoke she saw the
livery of the butler disappearing at the tall glass doors letting out
to the gallery. She did not know that the butler had seen much and
heard somewhat; that being a butler he was wise.
"But it's got to be--we've got to go through now!" he went on savagely.
"Why did you start this, then? Why did you let me know?"
"It was he who started it in me--ambition! No, I always had it. From
the day I was born I wanted to climb, to win, to be rich, to have
things in my hands. All girls want that, I suppose, till they know how
little it is. So I married him--I tried to, and I did. I knew he had
money.... But then there was more I wanted, after all. I only wanted
that something _else_, too, that any woman wants--what she's got to
have, once in her life, rich or poor, because she's a woman--some one
who truly loves her for herself as she is, because she is what she
is--because she's a woman!
"Oh, I looked all around me here, a long time after I came here, for
what I'd missed. I've never been happy here. I didn't have it. I
wanted it. At last I saw it. I wanted it. Its price is ruin--for
two, you and me. I'm like you. If it's wrong, I don't know where the
wrong began! I didn't mind, so far as I was concerned. Let a woman
love you, and she'll do anything, no matter how it hurts--herself. But
not _you_--not the man she loves and wants to respect, Charley."
"But--me? I am not good enough for you!"
"Oh, boy! How sweet that sounds to me! Say it over again to me! You
make me think I might some day be worth a man's love. It's got away
from us now. It's all too late. Everything's too late. When he--Mr.
Rawn--comes back, we've got to tell him. I've done what I was set to
do--but not the way he thought, not the way any of us thought!"
IX
"Yes, he must know!" Halsey nodded. He held her hand now in his own.
They swept on, as upon some vast wave, helpless, clinging to each
other, he doing what he could to save her.
"I don't know how to tell him," she wailed. "There was something Pagan
in me and I didn't know it. I thought I was in hand, but I wasn't! I
started low, and I wanted to climb up--and up--and up! Oh, Charley,
look!" She leaned toward him across the table, pleading. "I was just
ambitions, just like any American girl--like every woman in the world,
I suppose. If I sold out, I didn't know it. I didn't _want_ you to
care for me. But you did, you do! I kept away from you, so that you
wouldn't, so that we _couldn't_--so that I'd always feel that _you_, at
least--"
"Where can it end?" he asked quietly.
"I don't care where it ends, that's the worst of it; I don't care! One
thing only is to my credit. I've kept my bargain--with him. I've paid
the price I agreed to give. There is no scandal about me--yet. And
there might have been!"
"Yes."
"But some way, when he sent me out for you, talked to me as he did,
treated me like a piece of merchandise as he did--for once I wavered.
For once, Charley, it seemed to me that I was released from all
obligations to him, that I was where I ought to have a chance for my
own hand, to see life as life could be for itself, to have the love
that's life for a woman. I wanted to be wooed and won by some one who
loved me, just as any woman wants to be, Charley, some time! And I
wasn't--I wasn't.... It was horrible.... It was horrible.... I
wanted to give love for love. I wanted what I couldn't get, and saw it
was too late to get it fair. And when I saw that you--that even you'd
sell out for _me_--why, where was the good, clean thing left in all the
world? I couldn't tell. I didn't know what to do. I don't know now.
But you put these papers before me now, and you expect me to shed tears
over them. I can't. I don't care. The worst was over for me before
now. It came when I knew you'd love me if I'd raise a finger to you.
Why didn't you make me love you first--long ago? _Then_ all would have
come right. Back there--at first--"
"They'll say that when your husband lost his fortune he lost his wife.
Yes--" he nodded. "They'll say that and believe it! That isn't true!"
"No, that isn't true. I was done with him the moment he set this
errand for me. No woman can love a man who will do that. But I was
done with him--from the first I never loved him, I never did--I only
married him! I sold out--what I had to sell, myself, my fitness for a
place like this. That was what I called success! I wanted to be some
one in the world! Look at me now--"
X
They sat, two figures in an inexorable drama that swept relentlessly
forward; tasting of a part of ambition's ripened fruit; yet hungering
with the vast, pitiful, merciless human hunger for that other fruit
that hung in a garden once not lost.
"If it costs my soul, I'll stand by you," he said at last; and he
reached out a hand to her suddenly.
"No, no!" she cried. "Wait! Wait! I want to think!"
A discreet cough sounded. The butler approached bearing coffee. He
wore a half sneer on his face now, the sneer of the unpaid mercenary.
He doubted, and had cause to doubt, whether the last month's salary
would be forthcoming; for butlers read morning papers. "Ah, er, Mrs.
Rawn--" he began.
"What do you want? How dare you speak to me!" she rejoined. "I do not
care to be disturbed! You may go!"
He did go; and this was on an errand of his own, an errand which ended
in Grace Halsey's chambers. For butlers sometimes take ingenious
revenge.
XI
Halsey and Virginia Rawn sat on for a time at the table, the almost
untasted breakfast before them. The sun grew warmer. After a time she
rose, and they passed from the gallery toward the interior of the
house. The tray upon the hall table held a scanty morning load for
it--one letter and a telegram; the former addressed to Mrs. Charles
Halsey, the latter to herself.
"Shall I?" she asked, and tore the envelope across.
"It must be from him," he said. She tossed it to him.
"Home to-night. JOHN RAWN."