Ah, he thought exultantly, he had power, now! Why, if he killed, he would be immune! He could rob, cheat, destroy, play the traitor or the idiot, say what he wished, do as he wished, and at the worst the world would smile indulgently and think him a little odd! If it reproached him at all, it would be with the manner of a doting mother, who begs lenience for her precocious offspring. One need not be a recluse, running away from the world, to be free of it: one only needed to be very rich. Wealth was a strong door: it kept out everything.
At this point in his thoughts, an unpleasant memory rose in his mind. “Strong door. You cannot close your strong doors tight enough—” Who had said that to him? Martin. He shifted irritably in his seat. Martin, that feckless fool, whose silly idealism had led him right into the pit of death, had destroyed his wife’s happiness and his children’s security—Martin, whose life was like a house without doors and bars, open to every evil and mental pestilence that was abroad.
The thought of Martin suddenly became so intense, so compelling, that he turned suddenly in his chair and stared at the door; had Martin entered then he would not have been at all surprised. It seemed to him that Martin’s personality invaded all the air, the very air he breathed, so that the essence of his body and his mind were pervaded by the etherealized substance of Martin’s body and mind. It was like, he thought, two streams of water merging and losing individual integrity, or two cells dissolving into one.
He jumped, startled, for the door was indeed opening. It was a shock to him to see Gregory Sessions entering, and not Martin. He laughed shortly. Gregory came in, and looked at him in surprise. “I was thinking about my precious brother, Martin,” said Ernest in apologetic explanation, “and I’m damned if I didn’t almost expect him to come in! Just as though he were waiting in the outer room—The most curious sensation—”
Then he stopped, abruptly noticing for the first time that Gregory was exceedingly pale and disturbed, and that in some way he had grown perceptibly older; his face seemed to have withered and shrunken together.
“Is there something wrong?” he asked in a changed voice.
Gregory slowly lowered himself into a chair; Ernest, in amazement, saw that his hands were shaking as he withdrew his handkerchief and touched his forehead with it. Then he looked up and regarded Ernest strangely.
“Perhaps, if I were superstitious, I would say it is very probable that Martin did come in,” he said hoarsely. He swallowed with difficulty. “They’ve just posted the latest notice of the dead and the missing and the wounded on the courthouse wall. I was passing there—” Ernest began to rise out of his seat as though propelled by some outside force, and his lips shrank, turned livid, twisted in his face. Gregory nodded; he looked aside, his cheek muscles visibly falling inwards. “Yes,” he added heavily, “Martin’s been killed. His brigade was ambushed, hundreds slaughtered, the stores carried off.” Ernest was standing now, his arms swinging like dead arms at his sides. Gregory got up, as though the seat had become intolerable to him, and he began to pace up and down the room, his hands behind his back, his head bent upon his chest. “Amy,” he said. “She probably knows now. Telegram from Washington. Amy, my poor little Amy! My God, what can we do for her now!”
Then, without shame or apology or an attempt to hide it, he began to weep. They were an old man’s tears, slow and painful.
“He was,” said Ernest stonily, “always a fool.”
“You can say that, even now, when he is dead?” asked Gregory, his voice strangling in his throat.
Ernest made a violent and aimless gesture. “Yes! Even now! He was always a fool! There was no reason on God’s earth why he should have gone, no reason for him doing that, or any other of the cursed things he did! There was no reason for him to die, to desert his wife and his children! But he must cut a figure, he must go forth on a crusade, he must tell the world that he is a little Jesus and a hero, better than other men, choking on his ideals and his own stupid holiness!” He stopped, for it seemed to him that his heart was in his neck, smothering him with its thick salty bulk and its terrible and thundering beat. He felt blindly for his chair, fell into it. His arms dropped like marble upon the desk and lay there, spread out, the palms upward. He stared before him, swallowing convulsively, moving his head slowly from side to side, as if in agony. “This will kill my mother,” he said dully.
“Your mother!” screamed Gregory, springing to the desk like a lean old tiger and leaning upon it toward the younger man. “What about Amy? This will kill Amy! Damn you, have you thought about Amy?” His bared yellow teeth gleamed between his purplish lips with hate.
Ernest did not reply for a moment, as if he had not heard. Then, without looking at Gregory, he said in a low voice: “But Amy loves me.”
There was a long and frightful silence. Then Gregory whispered, trembling: “Are you mad?” And then, over and over, in a sinking whisper: “Are you mad? Are you quite mad?”
Ernest put his hand to his eyes, and spoke from behind it, in a dead but very quiet voice: “No, I am not mad. And you know I’m not. You’ve known all the time that she loves me. And that I love her. It is too late in the game, Gregory Sessions, for you to be a worse hypocrite than you are. But it doesn’t matter now. This won’t kill Amy. It will shock her terribly, perhaps overcome her for awhile. She was fond of Martin, loved him in a way, the way a mother loves a child. But only you and I know what she had to bear. There are her children, too. We can rescue something from the wreck for them, now. We can really do something for Amy and her children—” He dropped his hand and regarded the shaking old man before him emptily. And waited.
“If you hurt Amy, after all this, I’ll—I’ll kill you,” said Gregory simply.
Ernest moved his head in sick disgust. “Don’t be a fool, sir. I’ll never hurt Amy again. I don’t think any one can hurt her. Even this won’t, very much. She is beyond any of us. But now she is in a position where we can help her.”
He got up, and touched the bell on his desk. His chief clerk came in alertly, on long shabby legs. “Bring me my coat and hat, please,” said Ernest curtly. When the man had gone out again, Gregory cried: “Where are you going? What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to Amy. At once.”
“No!” Gregory ran like a youth around the desk, seized Ernest by the lapels of his coat. He shook him with a savagery that even he realized was impotent and brittle. “You’re not going to her! Haven’t you hurt her enough? Do you know you broke her heart when you married May? Do you think I didn’t know, that I couldn’t see every thought behind her poor face? You killed her, then and there! But you’re not satisfied, you want to stamp on her now! You’re not going! I won’t let you go!”
The clerk returned with the coat and hat. His long gray face was impassive, and there was no knowing what he had heard. If he felt some surprise at seeing his employer in the grip of old Mr. Sessions, he did not show it. He merely held the coat for Ernest to put his arms into. Ernest snatched the garment from him, motioned with his head for the man to leave. When they were alone again, he said to Gregory: “Please don’t tear at me like that, sir. And stop threatening me. It sounds silly; like a tenth-rate play. Do you think you can stop me? Do you think anything you have to say can stop me or change my mind? Don’t be a fool!”
But Gregory clutched him more desperately than ever. “What are you going to do? What can you possibly say to her? It’s not your place to go to her; do you want to ruin her more, put a scandal on her? Do you want slimy tongues licking her? Haven’t you done her harm enough already, without making her open game for any dog to hunt?”
Ernest shrugged him off so violently that he almost fell. The younger man’s eyes were literally full of flame, and his face was as rigid as granite. “You are a worse fool than I thought you! Get out of my way!”
“May! Your own children! Can’t you think of them? You have no right to do this! It’s my place to go—I’ll go with you—!”
Ernest snatched up
his hat. “Why, damn you!” he said quietly and slowly, “you are a reprobate as well as a fool! What did you think I was going to do?” He spat. “Get out of my way! I’m going to her, because I’m the only thing she really loves, because I’m the only one that can help her now. Don’t worry, you yellow old dog, we won’t talk of love! I’m going to her, to bring her, and her children, home. To the place where she belongs.”
Gregory had taken his arm again, but Ernest flung him off, ran around the desk, and went out.
Gregory stood where he had thrust him. His mouth was open, and he was gasping. His face was the color of saffron. “There are things a man can’t overlook. In very decency. Things a man can’t overlook. I’ve come a long way with him. He’s always been respectful and full of deference, the vicious devil! Because we could use each other, but he could use me more than I could use him. No one could ever use him, curse him! But there are things a man can’t overlook, if he wants to keep on calling himself a man. This is the end—”
But he knew that he lied. And this knowledge, this knowledge of himself, made him retch. His sensation of helplessness before Ernest was almost voluptuous.
Finally he went home, thinking how he could tell May. When he arrived, she was in the nursery, and he sent for her to come downstairs. When she saw his face, she was horrified. But he said quietly enough: “May, my love, we have just heard that Martin has been killed—”
“Oh,” said May faintly, and sat down, the color running out of her plump and dimpled cheeks.
Gregory took her hands and held them tightly. It was so terribly necessary to him for her to believe what he was about to tell her.
“Ernest and I—were together—near the courthouse, when we heard about it. It was posted on the wall. Naturally, he said he would go to his mother at once.” He swallowed, tensed himself. “Florabelle’s house, as you know, is on the way to—to the farm. So I suggested to him, that after he told his mother, he go on to Amy’s, do what he could, and then bring her and the children home. No doubt Florabelle will go with him to get her.”
May burst into tears, put her lacy handkerchief to her eyes, and rocked, stricken with grief, in her chair. “Oh, poor Amy! My poor darling! And how good of you, dear Gregory, to think of bringing her home! My poor darling, this will break her heart! After all she has had to endure, too. But perhaps Ernest should have come home to me, first, and I would have gone with him—A man never knows what to, say to a poor woman in these circumstances.”
“No, my love, he should not have come home first. Remember, he had to see his mother. His first duty was there; Martin is her son, remember. And it was my suggestion that he go without delay to Amy, and bring her home. I confess I wasn’t up to it, myself. So I came home to tell you, so you would have time to prepare. After all, there are four little children.”
May jumped up, the need for action practically overcoming her grief for her cousin. “Of course! I must open the bedrooms at once. Let me see! Amy can have the rose bedroom, across from mine. It is just big enough for her and the baby. Lucy and Elsa can share Gertrude’s room; it’s very big and sunny. Three little white beds side by side—” She wiped the last tear from her eyes. “What a noisy household we shall be, with all these children! I’ll have to get two more nursemaids, and Heaven knows where they will sleep!” She sighed, smiled ruefully. “I’m afraid none of us will have much peace with a household of babies! Well, it can’t be helped, and I’ll be glad to have Amy with me, you know that, Gregory.”
She hurried up the stairs. Gregory stood immobile for a few moments, then he ran from the house, calling for his carriage.
CHAPTER L
Ernest, once in the street, slowed down to a firm but casual walk. He mounted the steep narrow street to Endicott Road, walked down it to the Endicott Hotel, where he found a line of hacks. He engaged the roomiest one, and was soon being driven down the quiet back-country road which was called Quaker Highway.
He had not yet left the confines of the city, however, and the houses that stood back from the road were large and elaborate, with great grounds, newly planted trees, gardens and stables. This section was called Quaker Terrace, and was rapidly becoming the most exclusive section of town, for it was little travelled, with all the advantages of city life and the quiet and dignity of country living. Later on, when the city had long overtaken it, swallowed it and digested it, excreted it thereafter in the form of slums, it was called Quakertown, though only one Quaker family, the Benshaws, ever really lived in it.
The hack stopped at the fancy-grilled iron gates of a tall, narrow-fronted-red-brick house, with white porches all around it in a wooden lace of fretwork, white cupolas and useless turrets, thin windows at least eight feet tall, like slits in the walls of a fortress, and a high broad door with a fanlight above it. The autumn sun was warm, and a nursemaid in cape and hood sat on the round seat about a tree, watching two babies tumbling about on a spread rug on the brown grass.
Ernest got out of the hack, leaned over the iron gate, and whistled softly. The nursemaid rose with a startled cry, then recognizing the whistler, her eyebrows arched in surprise, and she came running respectfully.
“Where is Mrs. Barbour?” asked Ernest peremptorily.
The girl stammered: “Mrs. Barbour, sir? Why, I believe she is in the drawing room. She was there about half an hour ago.”
“Damn,” muttered Ernest. He looked at the girl sternly. “See here, my girl, I have something to tell Mrs. Bouchard that I don’t wish Mrs. Barbour to hear yet. Will you please see if you can find Mrs. Bouchard, and tell her I am waiting out here for her? I have only a moment or two to spare. Step along, my girl, step along!”
The nursemaid fled respectfully. Ernest opened the gate and moved around to the side of the house, where he could not be seen from the south windows. He did not have long to wait, for Florabelle, wrapped in a gay blue cape, came out of the side entrance. In the sunlight, her light golden hair turned to threads of fire. She glanced about anxiously, then seeing Ernest beckon around the side of the house, she ran up to him. She was a diminutive and dainty little creature, and the top of her head hardly rose above his shoulder.
“Ernest! What on earth is the matter? Is May ill? The children—?”
He kissed her forehead gently. “No, love. No one is ill. It is much worse.” He paused. “Martin has been killed. We have just heard.”
She cried out, faintly, paling; the cloak fell open, showing her white and throbbing throat. But she did not cry, as he had expected. She merely looked shocked.
“Oh, poor Amy!” she exclaimed in a subdued voice.
“Yes, poor Amy indeed,” replied Ernest gravely. “I’m going to her now, and am taking her and the children home with me.”
At last tears came into Florabelle’s pretty blue eyes, and one of them spilled over onto her round soft cheek. She said: “Is May with you?”
“No.” Ernest spoke carefully. “She has quite a lot to do to prepare the house for Amy and the children, so she has sent me to get Amy.”
“Let me go with you, Ernest. Wait, and I’ll just put on a bonnet—”
“No, Florrie. You will have your hands full with Ma. Go back and tell her, as gently as you can. It will be very hard on her, at this time, just after her influenza.”
“But—” Florabelle paused, and seemed doubtful. It appeared a little odd to her that Ernest, who had been Martin’s bitter enemy, should be going to comfort his widow, to bring her home. And all alone, too. The more she thought of it the stranger it became to her, and her smooth white forehead knotted a little as she tried to puzzle it out.
Ernest patted her shoulder. “Now, run back like a good girl, and tell Ma. I’m not up to it, myself. And tomorrow, after Amy is settled, May would like you to come to see her.”
Florabelle’s artless face cleared, and standing on tiptoe, she kissed her brother’s cheek. It frightened her that his flesh was cold to her lips, and she looked at him sharply. She was not a very observing young
woman, and it occurred to her for the first time that he was quite ghastly, and that there were dark ridges under his eyes and about his mouth, giving him a most haggard expression. She was greatly touched. It was evident to her that Martin’s death had hit him deeper than any one would have suspected, and she burst out crying in sympathy.
Ernest was not ill-pleased; he had seen that Florabelle had scented something puzzling, and her attention being diverted relieved him. He went back to the hack and was driven rapidly away. Alone, his mouth fell open a little, as though there were a pain in his chest, and he began to sigh at intervals, over and over, audibly. Once or twice a tremor ran over him, and he shivered as if with cold. But he was not thinking of his dead brother, nor of the very likely possibility that a bullet made by Barbour & Bouchard, fired by a rifle made by Barbour & Bouchard, had killed him. If it had occurred to him, he would merely have shrugged, for he was not the man to indulge in whimsical and sentimental philosophies.
During the past several years he had not seen Amy more than five times. And in all those years she had never entered the Sessions house. He had seen her, alone, at Dorcas’ house, and at Florabelle’s house. Martin, apparently, had been too much engrossed in his work to accompany her. He had, however, never seen her children, but he thought of them a great deal. Because they were of Amy’s body, he sometimes thought of them as being his, and the poverty into which their father had forced them agitated him with impotent rage.
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