Barriers Burned Away
Page 14
CHAPTER XIII
VERY COLD
When Dennis entered Mr. Ludolph's store Christine was absent on a visitto New York. On her return she resumed her old routine. At this timeshe and her father were occupying a suite of rooms at a fashionablehotel. Her school-days were over, Mr. Ludolph preferring to completeher education himself in accordance with his peculiar views and tastes.She was just passing into her twentieth year, and looked upon the worldfrom the vantage points of health, beauty, wealth, accomplishments ofthe highest order, and the best social standing. Assurance of a longand brilliant career possessed her mind, while pride and beauty werelike a coronet upon her brow. She was the world's ideal of a queen.
And yet she was not truly happy. There was ever a vague sense of unrestand dissatisfaction at heart. She saw that her father was proud andambitious in regard to her, but she instinctively felt that he neitherloved nor trusted her to any great extent. She seemed to be living ina palace of ice, and at times felt that she was turning into iceherself; but her very humanity and womanhood, deadened and warpedthough they were, cried out against the _cold_ of a life without God orlove. In the depths of her soul she felt that something was wrong, butwhat, she could not understand. It seemed that she had everything thatheart could wish, and that she ought to be satisfied.
She had at last concluded that her restlessness was the prompting ofa lofty ambition, and that if she chose she could win world-widecelebrity as an artist. This, with the whole force of her strong nature,she had determined to do, and for over two years had worked with anenergy akin to enthusiasm. She had resolved that painting should bethe solid structure of her success, and music its ornament.
Nor were her dreams altogether chimerical, for she had remarkabletalent in her chosen field of effort, and had been taught to use thebrush and pencil from childhood. She could imitate with skill andtaste, and express with great accuracy the musical thought of thecomposer; but she could not create new effects, and this had alreadybegun to trouble her. She worked hard and patiently, determined tosucceed. So great had been her application that her father saw theneed of rest and change, and therefore her visit to New York. She hadnow returned strengthened, and eager for her former studies, and resumedthem with tenfold zest.
The plan of rearranging the store on artistic principles daily grewin favor with her. It was just the exercise of taste she delighted in,and she hoped some day to indulge it on palace walls that would be herown. Her father's pride caused him to hesitate for some time, but shesaid: "Why, Chicago is not our home; we shall soon be thousands ofmiles away. You know how little we really care for the opinions of thepeople here: it is only our own pride and opinion that we need consult.I see nothing lowering or unfeminine in the work. I shall scarcelytouch a thing myself, merely direct; for surely among all in youremploy there must be one or two pairs of hands not so utterly awkwardbut that they can follow plain instructions. My taste shall do it all.We are both early risers, and the whole change can be made before thestore is opened. Moreover," she added (with an expression indicatingthat she would have little difficulty in ruling her future Germancastle, and its lord also), "this is an affair of our own. Those youemploy ought to understand by this time that it is neither wise norsafe to talk of our business outside."
After a moment's thought she concluded: "I really think that the properarrangement of everything in the store as to light, display, and effect,so that people of taste will be pleased when they enter, would addthousands of dollars to your sales; and this rigid system of oldSchwartz's, which annoys us both beyond endurance, will be broken up."
Won over by arguments that accorded with his inclinations, Mr. Ludolphgave his daughter permission to carry out the plan in her own way.
She usually accompanied her father to the store in the morning. He,after a brief glance around, would go to his private office and attendto correspondence. She would do whatever her mood prompted. Sometimesshe would sit down for a half-hour before one picture; again she wouldexamine most critically a statue or a statuette. Whenever new musicwas received, she looked it over and carried off such pieces as pleasedher fancy.
She evidently was a privileged character, and no one save her fatherexercised the slightest control over her movements. She treated allthe clerks, save old Schwartz, as if they were animated machines; andby a quiet order, as if she had touched a spring, would set them inmotion to do her bidding. The young men in the store were of Germandescent, and rather heavy and undemonstrative. Mr. Schwartz's systemof order and repression had pretty thoroughly quenched them. They wereeducated to the niches they filled, and seemed to have no thoughtbeyond; therefore they were all unruffled at Miss Ludolph's air ofabsolute sovereignty. Mr. Schwartz was as obsequious as the rest, but,as second to her father in power, was permitted some slight familiarity.In fact this heavy, stolid prime-minister both amused and annoyed her,and she treated him with the caprice of a child toward an elephant--attimes giving him the sugar-plum of a compliment, and oftenerpricking him with the pin of some caustic remark. To him she was theperfection of womankind--her reserved, dispassionate manner, her steady,unwearied prosecution of a purpose, being just the qualities that hemost honored; and he worshipped her reverently at a distance, like anold astrologer adoring some particularly bright fixed star. No whiskingcomets or changing satellites for old Schwartz.
As for Dennis, she treated him as she probably had treated Pat Murphy,and for several days had no occasion to notice him at all. In fact hekept out of her way, choosing at first to observe rather than beobserved. She became an artistic study to him, for her every movementwas grace itself, except that there was no softness or gentleness inher manner. Her face fascinated him by its beauty, though its expressiontroubled him--it was so unlike his mother's, so unlike what he felta woman's ought to be. But her eager interest in that which was becomingso dear to him--art--would have covered a multitude of sins in hiseyes, and with a heart abounding in faith and hope, not yet diminishedby hard experience, he believed that the undeveloped angel existedwithin her. But he remembered her frown when she had first noticed hisobservation of her. The shrewd Yankee youth saw that her pride wouldnot brook even a curious glance. But while he kept at a most respectfuldistance he felt that there was no such wide gulf between them as sheimagined. By birth and education he was as truly entitled to heracquaintance as the young men who sometimes came into the store withher and whom she met in society. Position and wealth were alone wanting,and in spite of his hard experience and lowly work he felt that theremust be some way for him, as for others, to win these.
He longed for the society of ladies, as every right-feeling young mandoes, and to one of his nature the grace and beauty of womanwere peculiarly attractive. If, before she came, the lovely faces of thepictures had filled the place with a sort of witchery, and createdabout him an atmosphere in which his artist-soul was awakening intolife and growth, how much more would it be true of this living visionof beauty that glided in and out every day!
"She does not notice me," he at first said to himself, "any more thando these lovely shadows upon the canvas. But why need I care? I canstudy both them and her, and thus educate my eye, and I hope my hand,to imitate and perhaps surpass their perfections in time."
But this cool, philosophic mood did not last long. It might answervery well in regard to the pictures on the walls, but there was amagnetism about this living, breathing woman that soon caused him tolong for the privilege of being near her and speaking to her of thatsubject that interested them both so deeply. Though he had never seenany of her paintings to know them, he soon saw that she was no novicein such matters and that she looked at works of art with the eye ofa connoisseur. In revery he had many a spirited conversation with her,and he trusted that some day his dreams would become real. He had theromantic hope that if she should discover his taste and strong loveof art she might at first bestow upon him a patronizing interest whichwould gradually grow into respect and acknowledged equality.