Complete Works of Frank Norris

by Frank Norris

  Miss Tremont — (How I hate those Harvard men.) Y-yes, perhaps — I — I might, you know.

  Jerry (reading)— “Jack Harper of Yale breaks through Harvard line and tackles runner for a loss — tremendous cheering on Yale bleachers.” Good boy, Jack. That’s the stuff.

  Miss Tremont (laughing with sudden perverseness) — And then again I might not, you know.

  Lord Orme (deliberately) — Miss Tressie, you and I have known each other a good bit now. You know, I’m sure, what you can expect of me. I’m not an intellectual, nor a physical giant, I confess, and I’m not what you Americans call smart, but our name is in Gotha and in Burke and all that sort of thing, and I can shoot straight and — and — and I can stick on anything that wears four hoofs —

  Jerry (still reading)—”3:35 P.M. — Yale is losing ground. Harvard has the ball on Yale’s twenty-five yard line. Yale does not seem able to stop Harvard’s masses on tackles and guards.”

  Miss Tremont — I’m sure you undervalue yourself, Lord Orme. I hate smart people, and it don’t follow that a girl must like a man just because he’s big and strong, and I adore riding.

  Lord Orme — As for that, Miss Tressie, there are about twenty thoroughbred hunters in my stables down in Surrey that are only waiting for you to ride them. Did you never ride to hounds? There’s a proper jolly sport. I’ve a pack down there, too. It’s not exactly the Quorn nor the Westminster, but it’s a tidy little hunt of thirty couples, and they make music, I promise you, when they’re in cry, and there’s no end of foxes. We hunt twice a week in season.

  Jerry continues reading in an agony of apprehension— “Yale is being driven back yard by yard. Harvard is still hammering the tackles with deadly effect. The ball is on Yale’s fifteen yard line. Harvard bleachers wild with excitement.”

  Miss Tremont — Just think, if Yale should lose! No, I’ve never even seen a fox hunt, but it must be great fun.

  Lord Orme — Talk about football!

  Miss Fremont — I’m afraid it would almost be better than football, Lord Orme.

  Lord Orme — I showed you the photograph of our town house, didn’t I? It’s close by the Row in Tillbury Circus. It’s by Vanburgh. Fairfax owned it once. And, of course, we would arrange with the dowager — that’s my aunt, you know — to have you presented.

  Miss Tremont (then breathlessly) — And I should be presented — presented at court? Oh! This winter? At the next Drawing-Room?

  Jerry (reading)— “The ball is now on Yale’s five yard line.”

  Lord Orme — Of course, Miss Tressie, though perhaps not at the very next Drawing-Room. I should wish to have the estate well settled up before we returned to London society.

  Miss Tremont — Settled up?

  Lord Orme — Things are tangled a bit. Of course — ah — (hesitating and blundering) there are — there are — ah — a few debts.

  Miss Tremont (her suspicions suddenly aroused by his embarrassment) — Debts! Is that why you have been talking like that to me, Lord Orme?

  Jerry— “Harvard’s advance suddenly checked. Yale rallies on her five-yard line.”

  Lord Orme (hastily) — Don’t misunderstand, Miss Tressie. Believe me, I do care for you, for yourself as much as for your money — more, I mean. But even looking at it in the worst light, after all, is it taking any unfair advantage of you? Consider the return. You would have a position and a name in London society second to but very few. Think of the town house, and the country seat in Surrey — and all the hunters and the fox hounds — and then you know there’s the yacht at Cowes — and you’d be presented — and — and hang it all, Miss Tressie, I really do care awfully, y’know. I say, now, Miss Tressie, we haven’t got time to put this thing off — we’ve got to settle it this afternoon. I’ll leave you to think it over for half an hour. I’ll take a stroll in the Mall or the Common or whatever it is, if I can get through this bally crowd, and come back in half an hour for your answer. What do you say, Miss Tressie?

  Miss Tremont (reflectively) — Well, all right, I’ll think it over.

  Lord Orme — Right you are. In half an hour I can have your answer?

  Miss Tremont — Yes — I think so. (Exit Lord Orme).

  Jerry (hearing the door close, turns from the window) — Hello, where’s Orme gone? What’s the matter, Tress? You look flustered.

  Miss Tremont (aroused from a reverie into which she has fallen) — Hum? What, what is it, Jerry? Flustered? Well, I should say so. Aren’t you?

  Jerry (groaning) — I can’t bear to watch the bulletins any more. Harvard’s going to win. We can’t keep ’em from it. Yale’s asleep. Jack hasn’t done a thing yet.

  Miss Tremont — Oh, Jack’s not in it any more.

  Jerry — Eh! What — you say that of Jack? You?

  Say, Tressie, that’s Orme’s “fine Italian hand,” I can see that.

  Miss Tremont — Never you mind, Jerry.

  Jerry — Look here, Tress, I know how Jack feels about you, and I don’t propose you shall turn him down for any title, if I can help it. What’s Orme been saying to you?

  Miss Tremont — Oh, things and — and — things.

  Jerry — For instance.

  Miss Tremont — He’s coming back for his answer in half an hour.

  Jerry — You let it go as far as that?

  Miss Tremont (her chin in the air) — Well?

  Jerry — And what do you propose telling him?

  Miss Tremont — I haven’t made up my mind yet.

  Jerry — Of course you have, you know you’re not going to marry Lord Orme.

  Miss Tremont — Pooh! I haven’t said so yet.

  Jerry — Say so now, then.

  Miss Tremont — Oh, don’t bother me. What’s that last bulletin.

  Jerry — Hello, hello. Oh, I say, Tress, look at what’s been going on while we’ve been talking. (Reads)— “Yale gets the ball on downs and punts out of danger.” That’s something like. Oh, Yale hasn’t lost yet. Tressie, don’t you do anything foolish now, and make a decision all in a moment that you’ll regret your whole life. Look at the men themselves. Don’t you suppose that Jack’s the best of the two? Why, he’s big enough to make three or four Lord Ormes, and you know how much he cares for you, and I know how much you care for him and — hold on, here’s another bulletin. (Excitedly). Look there, Tressie. (Reads)— “Yale’s ball in center of the field. Jack Harper makes a twenty yard run around Harvard’s left end.” Listen to the crowd in the street shouting. That’s the longest run of the day.

  Miss Fremont — Well, of course, I care for Jack. It’s not that I like Jack any less.

  Jerry — Honestly now, isn’t he the best old chap you — wait a minute, here’s another— “Yale men playing like fiends; have just worked a trick on Harvard that has netted a gain of ten yards.”

  Miss Tremont — Splendid. Of course Jack’s a dear. I never said he wasn’t.

  Jerry — Then why do you let Orme talk you out of it? Orme’s just after your —

  Miss Tremont — What’s that next bulletin?

  Jerry (in great excitement) — It’s Jack again. Oh, Tressie, we’ll beat ’em yet.

  Miss Tremont — What, what did he do?

  Jerry (reading)— “Yale has the ball on Harvard’s twenty-five yard line. Jack Harper makes ten more yards around the end.” And you said Jack wasn’t in it.

  Miss Tremont — I never said it.

  Jerry — You did.

  Miss Tremont — I never. Jack’s all right.

  Jerry — You bet — every time. Lord Orme, pooh! and his old hounds and his dowager and his debts. — Look there, look: “Yale is outplaying Harvard at every point.”

  Miss Tremont — He has got debts.

  Jerry — And the governor’s good money is to pay them off while — hold on: “Yale is on Harvard’s twelve yard line.”

  Miss Tremont — Glorious — and his nose is too long.

  Jerry — Oh, confound him and his nose, watch the game; here, look (
more and more excited)— “Yale is on the ten yard line. Now on the eight. The Yale bleachers are yelling like mad” — I should think they would.

  Miss Tremont (clasping her hands in excitement) — Oh, we must win now.

  Jerry (shouting)— “Five yards.”

  Miss Tremont — Oh, Jerry, isn’t it exciting. Oh, if I could only see it all. Oh, Jerry, if we should fumble now.

  Jerry — Fumble nothing. Jack’s there, and don’t you forget it. Dear old Jack.

  Miss Tremont — Dear old Jack.

  Jerry — Hear the crowd in the street giving the Yale yell. Think of it at Springfield now. Can’t you just, just hear ‘em. Can’t you hear the bleachers roaring — just like thunder, Tressie. That’s better than a lot of mangy foxhounds yelping, ain’t it?

  Miss Tremont — You bet it is — Yale! Yale!

  Jerry — Here’s another bulletin. Yale’s on the twelve-yard line. “Harper makes three yards through tackle.” Only nine yards more. “Harper makes another gain.” Yale’s on the eight yard line; on the six; on the five; on the three, and — now — now — now — now — (at the top of his voice, and throwing his hat in the air) — Tressie, Jack’s made the TOUCHDOWN! We’ve won! Oh, ain’t it grand — ain’t it glorious! Three times three for Yale! Say, Tressie, what’s the matter with Jack Harper?

  Miss Tremont — He’s all right, you bet, every time.

  (Enter Lord Orme, who stands mystified in the doorway).

  Jerry — Who’s all right?

  Miss Tremont — Jack.

  Jerry — Who?

  Both together — Jack.

  Lord Orme (with a puzzled smile) — Is this some sacred and religious rite, some mysterious incantation, that I’ve interrupted? Miss Tressie, your hair’s tumbling down; your gloves are split; your hat is all awry; your cheeks red. If I may be permitted to use the word, you do look regularly — ah — regularly bloused. And to think this is the little girl who’s to be presented at the next Drawing-Room.

  Miss Tremont (shouting) — No it’s not. Bother your old Drawing-Room. Can’t you see? Jack’s won the game.

  THE PUPPETS AND THE PUPPY

  DIALOGUE FROM THE WAVE OF MAY 22, 1897.

  “There are more things in your philosophy than are dreamed of in Heaven and Earth.”

  CHARACTERS:A Lead Soldier. A Doll. A Mechanical Rabbit. A Queen’s Bishop, from the chessboard. Japhet, a wooden mannikin from Noah’s Ark. Sobby, the Fox-terrier Puppy.

  SCENE: A corner of the play-room carpet.

  TIME: The night after Christmas.

  The Lead Soldier — Well, here we are, put into this Room, for something, we don’t know what; for a certain time, we don’t know how long; by somebody, we don’t know who. It’s awful!

  The Doll — And yet we know — I think I can speak for all of us — we know that there is a Boy.

  The Mechanical Rabbit (reflectively) — The Boy — the Boy — it’s a glimpse into the infinite.

  The Queen’s Bishop — Boy, forsooth! There is no Boy, except that which exists in your own imaginations. You have created a figment — a vast, terrible, empty nothing, to complement your own imperfections. I have given great thought to the matter. There is, perhaps, a certain Force that moves us from time to time — a certain vague power, not ourselves, that shifts us here and there. All of us chessmen believe in that. We are the oldest and highest cult of you all. But even this — what shall I call it? — this Force, is not omnipotent. It can move us only along certain lines. I still retain my individuality — still have my own will. My lines are not those of the knight, or the pawn, or the castle, and no power in the Room can make them so. I am a free agent — that’s what is so terrible.

  The Doll — Ah, you think you’ve solved it all — you, with your science and learning. There is a Boy, and I am made in his image.

  The Lead Soldier — And I.

  Japhet — And I.

  The Mechanical Rabbit — Yes, yes, the Doll must be right. Who else could have implanted within me this strange power of playing upon these cymbals? Somebody must have wound me up. I say it was the Boy.

  Japhet — But, come now; let us consider a moment. One thing we can all agree upon. Some day, sooner or later, we shall be Thrown-away. It is the inevitable end of all toys. We shall be Thrown-away and go to the Garret. Then what?

  The Doll — Dreadful question.

  Japhet — This is what I believe: Some day I shall be Thrown-away and go on that last voyage to the Garret, but not forever. I look forward to a time when I shall be made of rosewood instead of common pine, and shall have a white shellac finish instead of this base coating of non-poisonous paint, and I shall live forever in a Noah’s Ark of silver.

  The Lead Soldier — What childish fallacy! It is against all reason to regard our lot as such infantile trickery. I, too, some day shall be Thrown-away, but my conception of immortality is no such child’s play as this. No; in course of time I shall be re-melted and cast again to form another lead soldier, who in his turn shall be re-melted and re-cast, and so on and on, forever and ever.

  The Queen’s Bishop — Dreams! dreams! dreams! What butterflies you chase! What phantoms you hug! After I have been Thrown-away, I shall gradually rot and decay, and fall to dust, and be finally absorbed by the elements —

  The Doll — And lose your identity? Never! Listen to me. I feel that in me there are three individualities, each of them me, and a fourth which is of Me, yet not in Me — the Not-me. There is the sawdust, the kid, and the china — a trinity. Then there is that mysterious something which cries “Papa! Mama!” when the Boy presses on my chest. This is the Not-me. This is the part of me that shall last after I’m Thrown-away. That is my conception of immortality.

  The Lead Soldier (soliloquizing) — And each time I am re-melted and re-cast I become a finer soldier — larger, firmer on my base, more life-like. Thus the race is improved. Immortality is but the betterment of the race.

  The Mechanical Rabbit (decisively) — When I am Thrown-away that’s the end of me — it’s annihilation.

  The Lead Soldier (after a pause) — Tell me this: Why was Falling-down brought into the Room? Here is another thing we are all at one upon — that it is wrong to Fall-down. It displeases the Boy.

  The Queen’s Bishop (sotto voice) — The Force that moves us, you mean.

  The Mechanical Rabbit — That’s all very well. I can see how it is wrong, horribly and fearfully wrong, for the Lead Soldier to Fall-down, when the Boy sets him in his ranks and he Falls-down, he drags with him the whole line of other soldiers. The wrongdoing does not stop with himself — it communicates itself to others. It is a taint that progresses to infinity. But why should it be wrong for me to Fall-down? I hurt no one but myself.

  The Queen s Bishop — It is wrong for you as well as for the Lead Soldier and myself. You can know nothing of the vast, grand scheme of the Room. Suppose I should Fall-down whenever I chose, and knock over, say, the king, or the castles — what a calamity it would be! It would disarrange the vast, grand plan of events. No, no; in keeping upright we are only helping on the magnificent, incomprehensible aim or the Room. The same moral law applies to us all. What’s wrong for one is wrong for us all.

  The Lead Soldier — But what shall we say in a case like this: The other day the Boy took hold of the drummer of my squad, and twisted and bent his standard so that he could no longer stand. He put him in the line, and naturally he Fell-down. Then the Boy threw him away. Was it the drummer’s fault, I ask? Why should he be punished for falling down, when the Boy himself twisted his standard? And again, I have heard of lead soldiers who never could stand because of some fault in the casting. Were they to blame? They were doomed before they were cast, and were Thrown-away afterward.

  Japhet — Dreadful problem! Any day the Boy may pull off my standard and Throw me away.

  The Queen’s Bishop — We cannot understand these things, but there must be reason in them. But if you come to that, why are we here anyhow? I owe m
y existence to the turning lathe. Did I ask to be turned?

  The Mechanical Rabbit — Or I to be made?

  Japhet — Or I to be whittled?

  The Doll — Or I to be stuffed?

  The Lead Soldier — Or I to be moulded? If I had been given choice in the matter I would have chosen to be the general of my box, who sits on a horse that is rearing up, and points with his sword. Accident alone put him there. His lead is no better than mine, and his uniform is only paint-deep. In the re-melting, perhaps, he may be cast as a private and I as the general.

  (Sobby, the Fox-terrier puppy, pushes open the door of the room with his nose. His eye falls upon the mechanical rabbit. He rushes at it, shakes it between his teeth, and in a few minutes has worried it to an unrecognizable mass of skin and springs. Then he turns upon the doll, whom he likewise destroys. He chews the head from Japhet, and, with a movement of his paw, knocks the lead soldier down the register. Then he growls and scrabbles over the Queen’s Bishop till it, as well, tumbles down the register. The Queen’s Bishop disappears, muttering, vaguely, something about the “vast, resistless forces of nature.”)

  THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY

  A DIALOGUE FROM THE WAVE OF JUNE 12, 1897.

  CHARACTERS: Tom, Dick, and Harry, and (later) Jack (who is engaged to Dolly Street).

  SCENE: The bay window of a certain down-town club of San Francisco. Some half dozen young men are present, smoking and chaffing and discussing “whiskey-and-sodas.” Directly opposite, on the other side of the street, are the windows of a fashionable milliner’s.

  Tom (looking out of the window) — I wonder now how many women stop and look in at that milliner’s window as they go by.

  Dick — One in three is a good average.

  Harry — If there was a bargain-sale sign out, they wouldn’t go by at all.

  Tom — Look — here comes a girl.

  Dick — She’s a stunner, too! But she’s in too much of a hurry. Bet she don’t stop.

  Harry — Bet she does Dick — Take you — how much?

  Tom — Hurry up — she’s almost in front.