The Magnificent Ambersons

by Booth Tarkington

  He went on more heavily, more slowly; and, more heavily and slowly still, entered Isabel’s room and shut the door. He did not come forth again, and bade Fanny good-night through the closed door when she stopped outside it later.

  “I’ve put all the lights out, George,” she said. “Everything’s all right.”

  “Very well,” he called. “Good-night.”

  She did not go. “I’m sure we’re going to enjoy the new little home, George,” she said timidly. “I’ll try hard to make things nice for you, and the people really are lovely. You mustn’t feel as if things are altogether gloomy, George. I know everything’s going to turn out all right. You’re young and strong and you have a good mind and I’m sure—” she hesitated—”I’m sure your mother’s watching over you, Georgie. Good-night, dear.”

  “Good-night, Aunt Fanny.”

  His voice had a strangled sound in spite of him; but she seemed not to notice it, and he heard her go to her own room and lock herself in with bolt and key against burglars. She had said the one thing she should not have said just then: “I’m sure your mother’s watching over you, Georgie.” She had meant to be kind, but it destroyed his last chance for sleep that night. He would have slept little if she had not said it, but since she had said it, he could not sleep at all. For he knew that it was true—if it could be true—and that his mother, if she still lived in spirit, would be weeping on the other side of the wall of silence, weeping and seeking for some gate to let her through so that she could come and “watch over him.”

  He felt that if there were such gates they were surely barred: they were like those awful library doors downstairs, which had shut her in to begin the suffering to which he had consigned her.

  The room was still Isabel’s. Nothing had been changed: even the photographs of George, of the Major, and of “brother George” still stood on her dressing-table, and in a drawer of her desk was an old picture of Eugene and Lucy, taken together, which George had found, but had slowly closed away again from sight, not touching it. To- morrow everything would be gone; and he had heard there was not long to wait before the house itself would be demolished. The very space which tonight was still Isabel’s room would be cut into new shapes by new walls and floors and ceilings; yet the room would always live, for it could not die out of George’s memory. It would live as long as he did, and it would always be murmurous with a tragic, wistful whispering.

  And if space itself can be haunted, as memory is haunted, then some time, when the space that was Isabel’s room came to be made into the small bedrooms and “kitchenettes” already designed as its destiny, that space might well be haunted and the new occupants come to feel that some seemingly causeless depression hung about it—a wraith of the passion that filled it throughout the last night that George Minafer spent there.

  Whatever remnants of the old high-handed arrogance were still within him, he did penance for his deepest sin that night—and it may be that to this day some impressionable, overworked woman in a “kitchenette,” after turning out the light will seem to see a young man kneeling in the darkness, shaking convulsively, and, with arms outstretched through the wall, clutching at the covers of a shadowy bed. It may seem to her that she hears the faint cry, over and over:

  “Mother, forgive me! God, forgive me!”

  Chapter XXXII

  * * *

  At least, it may be claimed for George that his last night in the house where he had been born was not occupied with his own disheartening future, but with sorrow for what sacrifices his pride and youth had demanded of others. And early in the morning he came downstairs and tried to help Fanny make coffee on the kitchen range.

  “There was something I wanted to say to you last night, Aunt Fanny,” he said, as she finally discovered that an amber fluid, more like tea than coffee, was as near ready to be taken into the human system as it would ever be. “I think I’d better do it now.”

  She set the coffee-pot back upon the stove with a little crash, and, looking at him in a desperate anxiety, began to twist her dainty apron between her fingers without any consciousness of what she was doing.

  “Why—why—” she stammered; but she knew what he was going to say, and that was why she had been more and more nervous. “Hadn’t—perhaps— perhaps we’d better get the—the things moved to the little new home first, George. Let’s—”

  He interrupted quietly, though at her phrase, “the little new home,” his pungent impulse was to utter one loud shout and run. “It was about this new place that I wanted to speak. I’ve been thinking it over, and I’ve decided. I want you to take all the things from mother’s room and use them and keep them for me, and I’m sure the little apartment will be just what you like; and with the extra bedroom probably you could find some woman friend to come and live there, and share the expense with you. But I’ve decided on another arrangement for myself, and so I’m not going with you. I don’t suppose you’ll mind much, and I don’t see why you should mind— particularly, that is. I’m not very lively company these days, or any days, for that matter. I can’t imagine you, or any one else, being much attached to me, so—”

  He stopped in amazement: no chair had been left in the kitchen, but Fanny gave a despairing glance around her, in search of one, then sank abruptly, and sat flat upon the floor.

  “You’re going to leave me in the lurch!” she gasped.

  “What on earth—” George sprang to her. “Get up, Aunt Fanny!”

  “I can’t. I’m too weak. Let me alone, George!” And as he released the wrist he had seized to help her, she repeated the dismal prophecy which for days she had been matching against her hopes: “You’re going to leave me—in the lurch!”

  “Why no, Aunt Fanny!” he protested. “At first I’d have been something of a burden on you. I’m to get eight dollars a week; about thirty-two a month. The rent’s thirty-six dollars a month, and the table-d’hote dinner runs up to over twenty-two dollars apiece, so with my half of the rent—eighteen dollars—I’d have less than nothing left out of my salary to pay my share of the groceries for all the breakfasts and luncheons. You see you’d not only be doing all the housework and cooking, but you’d be paying more of the expenses than I would.”

  She stared at him with such a forlorn blankness as he had never seen. “I’d be paying—” she said feebly. “I’d be paying—”

  “Certainly you would. You’d be using more of your money than—”

  “My money!” Fanny’s chin drooped upon her thin chest, and she laughed miserably. “I’ve got twenty-eight dollars. That’s all.”

  “You mean until the interest is due again?”

  “I mean that’s all,” Fanny said. “I mean that’s all there is. There won’t be any more interest because there isn’t any principal.”

  “Why, you told—”

  She shook her head. “No, I haven’t told you anything.”

  “Then it was Uncle George. He told me you had enough to fall back on. That’s just what he said: ‘to fall back on.’ He said you’d lost more than you should, in the headlight company, but he’d insisted that you should hold out enough to live on, and you’d very wisely followed his advice.”

  “I know,” she said weakly. “I told him so. He didn’t know, or else he’d forgotten, how much Wilbur’s insurance amounted to, and I—oh, it seemed such a sure way to make a real fortune out of a little—and I thought I could do something for you, George, if you ever came to need it—and it all looked so bright I just thought I’d put it all in. I did—every cent except my last interest payment—and it’s gone.”

  “Good Lord!” George began to pace up and down on the worn planks of the bare floor. “Why on earth did you wait till now to tell such a thing as this?”

  “I couldn’t tell till I had to,” she said piteously. “I couldn’t till George Amberson went away. He couldn’t do anything to help, anyhow, and I just didn’t want him to talk to me about it—he’s been at me so much about not putting more in than I
could afford to lose, and said he considered he had my—my word I wasn’t putting more than that in it. So I thought: What was the use? What was the use of going over it all with him and having him reproach me, and probably reproach himself? It wouldn’t do any good—not any good on earth.” She got out her lace handkerchief and began to cry. “Nothing does any good, I guess, in this old world. Oh, how tired of this old world I am! I didn’t know what to do. I just tried to go ahead and be as practical as I could, and arrange some way for us to live. Oh, I knew you didn’t want me, George! You always teased me and berated me whenever you had a chance from the time you were a little boy—you did so! Later, you’ve tried to be kinder to me, but you don’t want me around— oh, I can see that much! You don’t suppose I want to thrust myself on you, do you? It isn’t very pleasant to be thrusting yourself on a person you know doesn’t want you—but I knew you oughtn’t to be left all alone in the world; it isn’t good. I knew your mother’d want me to watch over you and try to have something like a home for you—I know she’d want me to do what I tried to do!” Fanny’s tears were bitter now, and her voice, hoarse and wet, was tragically sincere. “I tried—I tried to be practical—to look after your interests—to make things as nice for you as I could—I walked my heels down looking for a place for us to live—I walked and walked over this town—I didn’t ride one block on a street-car—I wouldn’t use five cents no matter how tired I—Oh!” She sobbed uncontrollably. “Oh! and now—you don’t want—you want—you want to leave me in the lurch! You—”

  George stopped walking. “In God’s name, Aunt Fanny,” he said, “quit spreading out your handkerchief and drying it and then getting it all wet again! I mean stop crying! Do! And for heaven’s sake, get up. Don’t sit there with your back against the boiler and—”

  “It’s not hot,” Fanny sniffled. “It’s cold; the; plumbers disconnected it. I wouldn’t mind if they hadn’t. I wouldn’t mind if it burned me, George.”

  “Oh, my Lord!” He went to her, and lifted her. “For God’s sake, get up! Come, let’s take the coffee into the other room, and see what’s to be done.”

  He got her to her feet; she leaned upon him, already somewhat comforted, and, with his arm about her, he conducted her to the dining room and seated her in one of the two kitchen chairs which had been placed at the rough table. “There!” he said, “get over it!” Then he brought the coffee-pot, some lumps of sugar in a tin pan, and, finding that all the coffee-cups were broken, set water glasses upon the table, and poured some of the pale coffee into them. By this time Fanny’s spirits had revived appreciably: she looked up with a plaintive eagerness. “I had bought all my fall clothes, George,” she said; “and I paid every bill I owed. I don’t owe a cent for clothes, George.”

  “That’s good,” he said wanly, and he had a moment of physical dizziness that decided him to sit down quickly. For an instant it seemed to him that he was not Fanny’s nephew, but married to her. He passed his pale hand over his paler forehead. “Well, let’s see where we stand,” he said feebly. “Let’s see if we can afford this place you’ve selected.”

  Fanny continued to brighten. “I’m sure it’s the most practical plan we could possibly have worked out, George—and it is a comfort to be among nice people. I think we’ll both enjoy it, because the truth is we’ve been keeping too much to ourselves for a long while. It isn’t good for people.”

  “I was thinking about the money, Aunt Fanny. You see—”

  “I’m sure we can manage it,” she interrupted quickly. “There really isn’t a cheaper place in town that we could actually live in and be—” Here she interrupted herself. “Oh! There’s one great economy I forgot to tell you, and it’s especially an economy for you, because you’re always too generous about such things: they don’t allow any tipping. They have signs that prohibit it.”

  “That’s good,” he said grimly. “But the rent is thirty-six dollars a month; the dinner is twenty-two and a half for each of us, and we’ve got to have some provision for other food. We won’t need any clothes for a year, perhaps—”

  “Oh, longer!” she exclaimed. “So you see—”

  “I see that forty-five and thirty-six make eighty-one,” he said. “At the lowest, we need a hundred dollars a month—and I’m going to make thirty-two.”

  “I thought of that, George,” she said confidently, “and I’m sure it will be all right. You’ll be earning a great deal more than that very soon.”

  “I don’t see any prospect of it—not till I’m admitted to the bar, and that will be two years at the earliest.”

  Fanny’s confidence was not shaken. “I know you’ll be getting on faster than—”

  “Faster?” George echoed gravely. “We’ve got to have more than that to start with.”

  “Well, there’s the six hundred dollars from the sale. Six hundred and twelve dollars it was.”

  “It isn’t six hundred and twelve now,” said George. “It’s about one hundred and sixty.”

  Fanny showed a momentary dismay. “Why, how—”

  “I lent Uncle George two hundred; I gave fifty apiece to old Sam and those two other old darkies that worked for grandfather so long, and ten to each of the servants here—”

  “And you gave me thirty-six,” she said thoughtfully, “for the first month’s rent, in advance.”

  “Did I? I’d forgotten. Well, with about a hundred and sixty in bank and our expenses a hundred a month, it doesn’t seem as if this new place—”

  “Still,” she interrupted, “we have paid the first month’s rent in advance, and it does seem to be the most practical—”

  George rose. “See here, Aunt Fanny,” he said decisively. “You stay here and look after the moving. Old Frank doesn’t expect me until afternoon, this first day, but I’ll go and see him now.”

  It was early, and old Frank, just established at his big, flat-topped desk, was surprised when his prospective assistant and pupil walked in. He was pleased, as well as surprised, however, and rose, offering a cordial old hand. “The real flare!” he said. “The real flare for the law. That’s right! Couldn’t wait till afternoon to begin! I’m delighted that you—”

  “I wanted to say—” George began, but his patron cut him off.

  “Wait just a minute, my boy. I’ve prepared a little speech of welcome, and even though you’re five hours ahead of time, I mean to deliver it. First of all, your grandfather was my old war-comrade and my best client; for years I prospered through my connection with his business, and his grandson is welcome in my office and to my best efforts in his behalf. But I want to confess, Georgie, that during your earlier youth I may have had some slight feeling of—well, prejudice, not altogether in your favour; but whatever slight feeling it was, it began to vanish on that afternoon, a good while ago, when you stood up to your Aunt Amelia Amberson as you did in the Major’s library, and talked to her as a man and a gentleman should. I saw then what good stuff was in you—and I always wanted to mention it. If my prejudice hadn’t altogether vanished after that, the last vestiges disappeared during these trying times that have come upon you this past year, when I have been a witness to the depth of feeling you’ve shown and your quiet consideration for your grandfather and for everyone else around you. I just want to add that I think you’ll find an honest pleasure now in industry and frugality that wouldn’t have come to you in a more frivolous career. The law is a jealous mistress and a stern mistress, but a—”

  George had stood before him in great and increasing embarrassment; and he was unable to allow the address to proceed to its conclusion.

  “I can’t do it!” he burst out. “I can’t take her for my mistress.”

  “What?”

  “I’ve come to tell you, I’ve got to find something that’s quicker. I can’t—”

  Old Frank got a little red. “Let’s sit down,” he said. “What’s the trouble?”

  George told him.

  The old gentleman listened sympathetically, only murmu
ring: “Well, well!” from time to time, and nodding acquiescence.

  “You see she’s set her mind on this apartment,” George explained. “She’s got some old cronies there, and I guess she’s been looking forward to the games of bridge and the kind of harmless gossip that goes on in such places. Really, it’s a life she’d like better than anything else—better than that she’s lived at home, I really believe. It struck me she’s just about got to have it, and after all she could hardly have anything less.”

  “This comes pretty heavily upon me, you know,” said old Frank. “I got her into that headlight company, and she fooled me about her resources as much as she did your Uncle George. I was never your father’s adviser, if you remember, and when the insurance was turned over to her some other lawyer arranged it—probably your father’s. But it comes pretty heavily on me, and I feel a certain responsibility.”

  “Not at all. I’m taking the responsibility.”

  And George smiled with one corner of his mouth. “She’s not your aunt, you know, sir.”

  “Well, I’m unable to see, even if she’s yours, that a young man is morally called upon to give up a career at the law to provide his aunt with a favourable opportunity to play bridge whist!”

  “No,” George agreed. “But I haven’t begun my ‘career at the law’ so it can’t be said I’m making any considerable sacrifice. I’ll tell you how it is, sir.” He flushed, and, looking out of the streaked and smoky window beside which he was sitting, spoke with difficulty. “I feel as if—as if perhaps I had one or two pretty important things in my life to make up for. Well, I can’t. I can’t make them up to—to whom I would. It’s struck me that, as I couldn’t, I might be a little decent to somebody else, perhaps—if I could manage it! I never have been particularly decent to poor old Aunt Fanny.”