Other Things Being Equal

by Emma Wolf

  Chapter XX

  We do not live wholly through ourselves. What is called fate is but theoutcome of the spinning of other individuals twisted into the woof ofour own making; so no life should be judged as a unit.

  Ruth Levice was not alone in the world; she was neither recluse nora genius, but a girl with many loving friends and a genial home-life.Having resolved to bear to the world an unchanged front, she outwardlydid as she had always done. Her mother's zealous worldliness returnedwith her health; and Ruth fell in with all her plans for a gaywinter,--that is, the plans were gay; Ruth's presence could hardly betermed so. The old spontaneous laugh was superseded by a gentle smile,sympathetic perhaps, but never joyous. She listened more, and seldom nowtook the lead in a general conversation, though there was a charm abouta tete-a-tete with her that earnest persons, men and women, felt withoutbeing able to define it. For the change, without doubt, was there.It was as if a quiet hand had been passed over her exuberant, happygirlhood and left a serious, thoughtful woman in its stead. A subtilechange like this is not speedily noticed by outsiders; it requires usagebefore an acquaintance will account it a characteristic instead of amood. But her family knew it. Mrs. Levice, wholly in the dark as to thecause, wondered openly.

  "You might be thirty, Ruth, instead of twenty-two, by the staidnessof your demeanor. While other girls are laughing and chatting as girlsshould, you look on with the tolerant dignity of a woman of graveconcerns. If you had anything to trouble you, there might be someexcuse; but as it is, why can't you go into enjoyments like the rest ofyour friends?"

  "Don't I? Why, I hardly know another girl who lives in such constantgayety as I. Are we not going to a dinner this evening and to the ballto-morrow night?"

  "Yes; but you might as well be going to a funeral for all the pleasureyou seem to anticipate. If you come to a ball with such a grandlyserious air, the men will just as soon think of asking a statue to danceas you. A statue may be beautiful in its niche, but people do not careto study its meaning at a ball."

  "What do you wish me to do, Mamma? I should hate the distinction of awall-flower, which you think imminent. I am afraid I am too big a womanto be frolicsome."

  "You never were that, but you were at least a girl. People will beginto think you consider yourself above them, or else that you have somesecret trouble."

  The smile of incredulity with which she answered her would have beenheart-breaking had it been understood. No flush stained the ivory pallorof her face at these thrusts in the dark; Louis was never annoyedin this way now. Her old-time excited contradictions never obtrudedthemselves in their conversations. A silent knowledge lay between themwhich neither, by word or look, ever alluded to. Mrs. Levice noted withdelight their changed relations. Louis's sarcasm ceased to be directedat Ruth; and though the familiar sparring was missing, Mrs. Levicepreferred his deferential bearing when he addressed her, and Ruth'sgrave graciousness with him. She drew her own conclusions, and acceptedRuth's quietness with more patience on this account.

  Louis understood somewhat; and in his manliness he could not hide thather suffering had cost him a new code of actions. But he could notunderstand as her father did. Despite her brave smile, Levice couldalmost read her heart-beats, and the knowledge brought a hardness and abitter regret. He grew to scanning her face surreptitiously, lookingin vain for the old, untroubled delight in things; and when theunmistakable signs of secret anguish would leave traces at times, hewould turn away with a groan. Yet there was nothing to be done. He knewthat her love had been no light thing nor could her giving up be so;but feeling that no matter what the present cost, the result wouldcompensate, he trusted to time to heal the wound. Meanwhile his ownself-blame at these times left its mark upon him.

  For Ruth lived a dual life. The real one was passed in her quietchamber, in her long solitary walks, and when she sat with her book,apparently reading. She would look up with blank, despairing eyes,clinched hands, and hard-set teeth when the thought of him and all herloss would steal upon her. Her father had caught many such a look uponher face. She had resolved to live without him, but accomplishment isnot so easy. Besides, it was not as if she never saw him. San Franciscois not so large a city but that by the turning of a corner you may notcome across a friend. Ruth grew to study the sounds the different kindsof vehicles made; and the rolling wheels of a doctor's carriage behindher would set her pulses fluttering in fright.

  She was walking one day along Sutter Street toward Gough from Octavia.The street takes a sudden down-grade midway in the block. She wasapproaching this declension just before the Boys' High School when acarriage drove quickly up the hill toward her. The horses gave a boundas if the reins had been jerked; there was the momentary flash of aman's stern, white face as he raised his hat; and Ruth was walking downthe hill, trembling and pale. It was the first time; and for one minuteher heart seemed to stop beating and then rushed wildly on. Whether shehad bowed or made any sign of recognition, she did not know. It didnot matter, though; if he thought her cold or strange or anything, whatdifference could it possibly make? For her there would be left foreverthis dead emptiness. These casual meetings were inevitable; and shewould come home after them worn-out and heavy-eyed. "A slight headache"was a recurrent excuse with her.

  They had common friends, and it would not have been surprising had shemet him at the different affairs to which she went, always through hermother's desire. But the dread of coming upon him slowly departed asthe months rolled by and with them all token of him. Time and again shewould hear allusions to him. "Dr. Kemp has developed into a misogynist,"pouted Dorothy Gwynne. "He was one of the few decided eligibles on thehorizon, but it requires the magnet of illness to draw him now. I reallymust look up the symptoms of a possible ache; the toilet and expressionof an invalid are very becoming, you know."

  "Dr. Kemp made a splendid donation to our kindergarten to-day. I havenot seen him since we were in the country, and he thought me lookingvery well. He inquired after the family, and I told him we had aresidence, at which he smiled." This from Mrs. Levice. Ruth would havegiven much to have been able to ask after him with self-possession, butthe muscles of her throat seemed to swell and choke her while silent.She went now and then to see Bob Bard in his flower-store; he wouldwithout fail inquire after "our friend" or tell her of his having passedthat day. Here was her one chance of inquiring if he was looking well,to which the answer was invariably "yes."

  She sat one night at the opera in her wonted beauty, with her soft,dusky hair rolled from her sweet Madonna face. Many a lorgnette wasraised a second and a third time toward her. Louis, seated next to her,resented with unaccountable ferocity this free admiration that she didnot see or feel.

  As the curtain went down on the first act, he drew her attention tosome celebrity then passing out. She raised her glass, but her hand fellnerveless in her lap. Immediately following him came Dr. Kemp. Theireyes met, and he bowed low, passing on immediately. The rest of theevening passed like a nightmare; she heard nothing but her heart-throbs,saw nothing but his beloved face regarding her with simple courtesy.Louis knew that for her the opera was over; the tell-tale bistrousshadows grew around her eyes, and she became deadly silent.

  "What a magnificent man he is," murmured Mrs. Levice, "and what animpressive bow he has!" Ruth did not hear her; but when she reachedher own room, she threw herself face downward on her bed in intolerableanguish. She was not a girl who cried easily. If she had been, hersuffering would not have been so intense,--when the flood-gates areopened, the river finds relief. Over and over again she wished she mightdie and end this eager, passionate craving for some token of love fromhim, or for the power of letting him know how it was with her. And itwould always be thus as long as she lived. She did not deceive herself;no mere friendship would have sufficed,--all or nothing after what hadbeen.

  Physically, however, she bore no traces of this continual restraint. Onthe contrary, her slender figure matured to womanly proportions. Littlechildren, seeing her, smiled responsively at her
, or clamored to betaken into her arms, there was such a tender mother-look about her. Bydegrees her friends began to feel the repose of her intellect andthe sympathy of her face, and came to regard her as the queen ofconfidantes. Young girls with their continual love episodes andexcitements, ambitious youths with their whimsical schemes of life andaspirations of love, sought her out openly. Few of these latter daredhope for any individual thought from her, though any of the older menwould have staked a good deal for the knowledge that she singled him forher consideration.

  Arnold viewed it all with inward satisfaction. He regarded memory butas a sort of palimpsest; and he was patiently waiting until his ownname should appear again, when the other's should have been sufficientlyobliterated.

  It was a severe winter, and everybody appreciated the luxury of a warmhome. December came in wet and cold, and la grippe held the country inits disagreeable hold. The Levices were congratulating themselves oneevening on their having escaped the epidemic.

  "I suppose the secret of it lies in the fact that we do not coddleourselves," observed Levice.

  "If you were to coddle yourself a little more," retorted his wife, "youwould not cough every morning as you do. Really, Jules, if you do notconsult a physician, I shall send for Kemp myself. I actually think itis making you thin."

  "Nonsense!" he replied carelessly; "it is only a little irritation ofthe throat every morning. If the weather is clear next week, I must goto New York. Eh, Louis?"

  "At this time of the year!" cried Mrs. Levice, in expostulation.

  "Some one has to go, and the only one that should is I."

  "I think I could manage it," said Louis, "if you would see about theother adjustment while I am gone."

  "No, you could not,"--when Levice said "no," it seldom meant an ultimate"yes." "Besides, the trip will do me good."

  "I shall go with you," put in Mrs. Levice, decidedly.

  "No, dear; you could not stand the cold in New York, and I could not bebothered with a woman's grip-sack."

  "Take Ruth, then."

  "I should love to go with you, Father," she replied to the questioningglance of his eyes. He seemed to ponder over it for a while, but shookhis head finally.

  "No," he said again; "I shall be very busy, and a woman would be anuisance to me. Besides, I wish to be alone for a while."

  They all looked at him in surprise; he was so unused to making testyremarks.

  "Grown tired of womankind?" asked Mrs. Levice, playfully. "Well, ifyou must, you must; don't overstay your health and visit, and bring ussomething pretty. How long will you be gone?"

  "That depends on the speediness of the courts. No more than three weeksat the utmost, however."

  So the following Wednesday being bright and sunny, he set off; thefamily crossed the bay with him.

  "Take care of your mother, Ruth," he said at parting, "and of yourself,my pale darling."

  "Don't worry about me, Father," she said, pulling up his furred collar;"indeed, I am well and happy. If you could believe me, perhaps you wouldlove me as much as you used to."

  "As much! My child, I never loved you better than now; remember that. Ithink I have forgotten everybody else in you."

  "Don't, dear! it makes me feel miserable to think I should cause you amoment's uneasiness. Won't you believe that everything is as I wish it?"

  "If I could, I should have to lose the memory of the last four months.Well, try your best to forgive me, child."

  "Unless you hate me, don't hurt me with that thought again. I forgiveyou? I, who am the cause of it all?"

  He kissed her tear-filled eyes tenderly, and turned with a sign to hermother.

  They watched to the last his loved face at the window, Ruth with a sadsmile and a loving wave of her handkerchief.

  Over at the mole it is not a bad place to witness tragedies. Pathosholds the upper hand, and the welcomes are sometimes as heart-rending asthe leave-takings. A woman stood on the ferry with a blank, working facedown which the tears fell heedlessly; a man, her husband, turned fromher, drew his hat down over his eyes, and stalked off toward thetrain without a backward glance. Parting is a figure of death in thisrespect,--that only those who are left need mourn; the others havesomething new beyond.