The Adventures of a Modest Man

by Robert W. Chambers

  CHAPTER XVI

  THE SIMPLEST SOLUTION OF AN ANCIENT PROBLEM

  In the silence befitting such an extraordinary occasion the companyformed a circle about the camp-fire.

  Presently Professor Rawson looked sharply at the damp dragon. "Child!"she exclaimed, "you ought to take that off this instant!"

  "But--but I haven't very much on," protested Molly Sandys with a shiver."I'm only dressed as a--a page."

  "It can't be helped," retorted the professor with decision; "that dragonis nothing but soaking pulp except where the tail is on fire!"

  Ellis hastily set his foot on the sparks, just as Molly Sandys jumped.There was a tearing, ripping sound, a stifled scream, and three-quartersof a page in blue satin and lisle thread, wearing the head and shouldersof a dragon, shrank down behind Professor Rawson's poncho-draped figure.

  "Here's my poncho," cried Ellis, hastily; "I am awfully sorry I rippedyour gown--I mean your pasteboard tail--but you switched it into thefire and it was burning."

  "Have you something for me?" inquired Miss Gay, coloring, but calm; "I'mnot very comfortable, either."

  Jones's enraptured eyes lingered on the slim shape in mail; he hated todo it, but he brought a Navajo blanket and draped in it the mostdistractingly pretty figure his rather nearsighted eyes had everencountered.

  "There," explained Ellis, courteously, "is the shanty. I've hung ablanket over it. Jones and I will sleep here by the fire."

  "Sleep!" faltered Molly Sandys. "I think we ought to be starting----"

  "The forests are flooded; we can't get you back to the Summer Schoolto-night," said Ellis.

  Professor Rawson shuddered. "Do you mean that we are cut off fromcivilization entirely?" she asked.

  "Look!" replied Ellis.

  The ridge on which the camp lay had become an island; below it roared aspreading flood under a column of mist and spray; all about them thewater soused and washed through the forest; below them from the forkscame the pounding thunder of the falls.

  "There's nothing to be alarmed at, of course," he said, looking at MollySandys.

  The grey eyes looked back into his. "Isn't there, really?" she asked.

  "Isn't there?" questioned Miss Gray's brown eyes of Jones's pleasant,nearsighted ones.

  "No," signalled the orbs of Jones through his mud-spattered eyeglasses.

  "I'm hungry," observed Professor Rawson in a patient but plaintivevoice, like the note of a widowed guinea-hen.

  So they all sat down on the soft pine-needles, while Ellis began hisculinary sleight-of-hand; and in due time trout were frying merrily,bacon sputtered, ash-cakes and coffee exhaled agreeable odors, andmounds of diaphanous flapjacks tottered in hot and steaming fragrance oneither flank.

  There were but two plates; Jones constructed bark platters for ProfessorRawson, Ellis and himself; Helen Gay shared knife and fork with Jones;Molly Sandys condescended to do the same for Ellis; Professor Rawson hada set of those articles to herself.

  And there, in the pleasant glow of the fire, Molly Sandys, cross-leggedbeside Ellis, drank out of his tin cup and ate his flapjacks; and HelenGay said shyly that never had she tasted such a banquet as this forestfare washed down with bumpers of icy, aromatic spring water. As forProfessor Rawson, she lifted the hem of her poncho and discreetly driedthat portion of the Rhine-maiden's clothing which needed it; and whileshe sizzled contentedly, she ate flapjack on flapjack, and trout aftertrout, until merriment grew within her and she laughed when the youngerpeople laughed, and felt a delightful thrill of recklessness tinglingthe soles of her stockings. And why not?

  "It's a very simple matter, after all," declared Jones; "it's nothingbut a state of mind. I thought I was leading a simple life before I camehere, but I wasn't. Why? Merely because I was _not_ in a state of mind.But"--and here he looked full at Helen Gay--"but no sooner had I begunto appreciate the charm of the forest"--she blushed vividly "no soonerhad I realised what these awful solitudes might contain, than,instantly, I found myself in a state of mind. Then, and then only, Iunderstood what heavenly perfection might be included in that frayed andfrazzled phrase, 'The Simple Life.'"

  "I understood it long ago," said Ellis, dreamily.

  "Did you?" asked Molly Sandys.

  "Yes--long ago--about six hours ago"--he lowered his voice, for MollySandys had turned her head away from the firelight toward the coolershadow of the forest.

  "What happened," she asked, carelessly, "six hours ago?"

  "I first saw you."

  "No," she said calmly; "I first saw you and took your picture!" Shespoke coolly enough, but her color was bright.

  "Ah, but before that shutter clicked, convicting me of a misdemeanor,your picture had found a place----"

  "Mr. Ellis!"

  "Please let me----"

  "No!"

  "Please----"

  A silence.

  "Then you must speak lower," she said, "and pretend to be watching thestream."

  Professor Rawson gleefully scraped her plate and snuggled up in herponcho. She was very happy. When she could eat no more she asked Joneswhat his theory might be concerning Wagner's influence on RichardStrauss, and Jones said he liked waltzes, but didn't know that the manwho wrote The Simple Life had anything to do with that sort of thing.And Professor Rawson laughed and laughed, and quoted a Greek proverb;and presently arose and went into the shanty, dropping the blanketbehind her.

  "Don't sit up late!" she called sleepily.

  "Oh, _no_!" came the breathless duet.

  "And don't forget to feed the swan!"

  "Oh, _no_!"

  A few minutes later a gentle, mellow, muffled monotone vibrated in theevening air. It was the swan-song of Professor Rawson.

  Ellis laid fresh logs on the blaze, lighted a cigarette, and returned tohis seat beside Molly Sandys, who sat, swathed in her poncho, leaningback against the base of a huge pine.

  "Jones _is_ right," he said; "the simple life--the older and simpleremotions, the primal desire--_is_ a state of mind."

  Molly Sandys was silent.

  "And a state of--heart."

  Miss Sandys raised her eyebrows.

  "Why be insincere?" persisted Ellis.

  "I'm not!"

  "No--no--I didn't mean you. I meant everybody----"

  "I'm somebody----"

  "Indeed you _are_!"--much too warmly; and Molly Sandys looked up at theevening star.

  "The simple life," said Ellis, "is an existence replete with sincerity.Impulse may play a pretty part in it; the capacity for the enjoyment ofsimple things grows out of impulse; and impulse is a child's reasoning.Therefore, impulse, being unsullied, unaffected in its source, is to berespected, cherished, guided into a higher development, so that it maybecome a sweet reasonableness, an unerring philosophy. Am I right, MissSandys?"

  "I think you are."

  "Well, then, following out my theorem logically, what is a man to dowhen, without an instant's warning, he finds himself----"

  There was a pause, a long one.

  "Finds himself where?" asked Molly Sandys.

  "In love."

  "I--I don't know," she said, faintly. "Doesn't the simple life teach himwhat is--is proper--on such brief acquaintance----"

  "_I_ didn't say the acquaintance was brief. I only said the love wassudden."

  "Oh--then I--I don't know----"

  "M-Mo-Mi-M-M----"

  He wanted to say "Molly," and he didn't want to say "Miss Sandys," andhe couldn't keep his mouth shut, so that was the phonetic result--amuttering monotone which embarrassed them both and maddened him till hestammered out: "The moment I saw you I--I can't help it; it's thesimplest thing to do, anyhow--to tell you----"

  "Me!"

  "You, M-M-Mo-Mi-M----" He couldn't say it.

  "Try," she whispered, stifling with laughter.

  "Molly!" Like a cork from a popgun came the adored yet dreaded name.

  Molly turned scarlet as Miss Gay and Jones looked up in pure amazementfrom the farther side of
the camp-fire.

  "_Don't_ you know how to make love?" she whispered in a fierce littlevoice; "_don't_ you? If you don't I am going off to bed."

  "Molly!" That was better--in fact, it was so low that she could scarcelyhear him. But she said: "Doesn't Helen Gay look charming in her tinarmour? She _is_ the dearest, sweetest girl, Mr. Ellis. She's my cousin.Do you think her pretty?"

  "Do you know," whispered Ellis, "that I am in dead earnest?"

  "Why, I--I hope so."

  "Then tell me what chance I stand. I am in love; it came awfullyquickly, as quickly as you snapped that kodak--but it has come tostay----"

  "But I am not in--love.

  "That is why I speak. I can't endure it to let you go--Heaven knowswhere----"

  "Only to New York," she said, demurely, and, in a low voice, she namedthe street and the number. "In an interval of sanity you shall have anopportunity to reflect on what you have said to me, Mr. Ellis. Beinga--a painter--and a rather famous one--for so young a man--you are, nodoubt, impulsive--in love with love--_not_ with a girl you met six hoursago."

  "But if I _am_ in love with her?"

  "We will argue that question another time."

  "In New York?"

  She looked at him, a gay smile curving her lips. Suddenly the clear,grey eyes filled; a soft, impulsive hand touched his for an instant,then dropped.

  "Be careful," she said, unsteadily; "so far, I also have only been inlove with love."

  Stunned by the rush of emotion he rose to his feet as she rose, eyemeeting eye in audacious silence.

  Then she was gone, leaving him there--gone like a flash into thecamp-hut; he saw the blanket twitching where she had passed behind it;he heard the muffled swan-song of her blanket-mate; he turned hisenchanted eyes upon Jones. Jones, his elbows on the ground, chin on hispalms, was looking up into the rapt face of Helen Gay, who sat by thefire, her mailed knees gathered up in her slim hands, the reflection ofthe blaze playing scarlet over her glittering tin armour.

  "Why may I not call you Helen?" he was saying.

  "Why should you, Mr. Jones?"

  The infatuated pair were oblivious of him. _Should_ he sneeze? No; hisown case was too recent; their attitude fascinated him; he sat downsoftly to see how it was done.

  "If--some day--I might be fortunate enough to call you more thanHelen----"

  "Mr. Jones!"

  "I can't help it; I love you so--so undauntedly that I have got to tellyou _something_ about it! You don't mind, do you?"

  "But I _do_ mind."

  "Very much?"

  Ellis thought: "Is _that_ the way a man looks when he says things likethat?" He shuddered, then a tremor of happiness seized him. Molly Sandyshad emerged from the hut.

  Passing the fire, she came straight to Ellis. "It's horrid in there.Don't you hear her? It's muffled, I know, because she's taken the swanto bed with her, and it's asleep, too, and acting as though ProfessorRawson's head were a nest-egg. I am not sleepy; I--I believe I shall situp by this delightful fire all night. Make me a nest of blankets."

  Jones and Helen were looking across the fire at them in silence; Ellisunrolled some blankets, made a nest at the foot of the pine full in thefire-glow. Swathed to her smooth white throat, Molly sank into them.

  "Now," she said, innocently, "we can talk. Helen! Ask Mr. Jones to makesome coffee. Oh, _thank_ you, Mr. Jones! Isn't this perfectly delicious!So simple, so primitive, so sincere"--she looked at Ellis--"so jolly. Ifthe simple life is only a state of mind I can understand how easy it isto follow it to sheerest happiness." And in a low voice, to Ellis: "Can_you_ find happiness in it, too?"

  Across the fire Helen called softly to them: "Do you want some toastedcheese, too? Mr. Jones knows how to make it."

  A little later, Jones, toasting bread and cheese, heard a sweet voicesoftly begin the Swan-Song. It was Helen. Molly's lovely, velvet voicejoined in; Ellis cautiously tried his barytone; Jones wisely remainedmute, and the cheese sizzled a discreet tremolo. It was indeed theswan-song of the heart-whole and fancy-free--the swan-song of theunawakened. For the old order of things was passing away--had passed.And with the moon mounting in silvered splendor over the forest, thenewer order of life--the simpler, the sweeter--became so plain to themthat they secretly wondered, as they ate their toast and cheese, howthey could have lived so long, endured so long, the old and dullcomplexity of a life through the eventless days of which their heartshad never quickened to the oldest, the most primitive, the simplest ofappeals.

  And so, there, under the burnished moon, soberly sharing their toastedcheese, the muffled swan-song of the incubating maiden thrilling theirenraptured ears, began for them that state of mind in the inviolatemystery of which the passion for the simpler life is hatched.

  "If we only had a banjo!" sighed Helen.

  "I have a jew's-harp," ventured Jones. "I am not very musical, but everycreature likes to emit some sort of melody."

  Ellis laughed.

  "Why not?" asked Helen Gay, quickly; "after all, what simpler instrumentcan you wish for?" And she laughed at Jones in a way that left himlight-headed.

  So there, in the moonlight and the shadows of the primeval pines,Jones--simplest of men with simplest of names--produced the simplest ofall musical instruments, and, looking once into the beautiful eyes ofHelen, quietly began the simplest of all melodies--the Spanish Fandango.

  And for these four the simple life began.

  * * * * *

  I waited for a few moments, but Williams seemed to consider that therewas nothing more to add. So I said:

  "Did they marry those two girls?"

  He glanced at me in a preoccupied manner without apparentlyunderstanding.

  "Did they marry 'em?" I repeated, impatiently.

  "What? Oh, yes, of course."

  "Then why didn't you say so?"

  "I didn't have to say so. Didn't you notice the form in which I ended?"

  "What's that got to do with it? You're not telling me a short story,you're telling me what really happened. And what really happens neverends artistically."

  "It does when I tell it," he said, with a self-satisfied smile. "LetFate do its worst; let old man Destiny get in his work; let Chance fixup things to suit herself. I wait until that trio finishes, then _I_step in and tell the truth in my own way. And, by gad! when I getthrough, Fate, Chance, and Destiny set up a yell of impotent fury andTruth looks at herself in the mirror in delighted astonishment, amazedto discover in herself attractions which she never suspected."

  "In other words," said I, "Fate no longer has the final say-so."

  "Not while the short-story writer exists," he grinned. "It's up to him.Fate slaps your face midway in a pretty romance. All right. But when Imake a record of the matter I pick, choose, sort, re-assort my box ofwords, and when things are going too rapidly I wink at Fate with mytongue in my cheek and round up everybody so amiably that nobody knowsexactly what did happen--and nobody even stops to think becauseeverybody has already finished the matter in their own minds to theirown satisfaction."