“Do you mean ‘communism’?” she asked, and she made their slow pace a little slower — they had only three blocks to go.
“Whatever the word is, I only mean that things don’t look very sensible now — especially to a man that wants to keep out of ’em and can’t! ‘Communism’? Well, at least any ‘decent sport’ would say it’s fair for all the strong runners to start from the same mark and give the weak ones a fair distance ahead, so that all can run something like even on the stretch. And wouldn’t it be pleasant, really, if they could all cross the winning-line together? Who really enjoys beating anybody — if he sees the beaten man’s face? The only way we can enjoy getting ahead of other people nowadays is by forgetting what the other people feel. And that,” he added, “is nothing of what the music meant to me. You see, if I keep talking about what it didn’t mean I can keep from telling you what it did mean.”
“Didn’t it mean courage to you, too — a little?” she asked. “Triumph and praise were in it, and somehow those things mean courage to me.”
“Yes, they were all there,” Bibbs said. “I don’t know the name of what he played, but I shouldn’t think it would matter much. The man that makes the music must leave it to you what it can mean to you, and the name he puts to it can’t make much difference — except to himself and people very much like him, I suppose.”
“I suppose that’s true, though I’d never thought of it like that.”
“I imagine music must make feelings and paint pictures in the minds of the people who hear it,” Bibbs went on, musingly, “according to their own natures as much as according to the music itself. The musician might compose something and play it, wanting you to think of the Holy Grail, and some people who heard it would think of a prayer-meeting, and some would think of how good they were themselves, and a boy might think of himself at the head of a solemn procession, carrying a banner and riding a white horse. And then, if there were some jubilant passages in the music, he’d think of a circus.”
They had reached her gate, and she set her hand upon it, but did not open it. Bibbs felt that this was almost the kindest of her kindnesses — not to be prompt in leaving him.
“After all,” she said, “you didn’t tell me whether you liked it.”
“No. I didn’t need to.”
“No, that’s true, and I didn’t need to ask. I knew. But you said you were trying to keep from telling me what it did mean.”
“I can’t keep from telling it any longer,” he said. “The music meant to me — it meant the kindness of — of you.”
“Kindness? How?”
“You thought I was a sort of lonely tramp — and sick—”
“No,” she said, decidedly. “I thought perhaps you’d like to hear Dr. Kraft play. And you did.”
“It’s curious; sometimes it seemed to me that it was you who were playing.”
Mary laughed. “I? I strum! Piano. A little Chopin — Grieg — Chaminade. You wouldn’t listen!”
Bibbs drew a deep breath. “I’m frightened again,” he said, in an unsteady voice. “I’m afraid you’ll think I’m pushing, but—” He paused, and the words sank to a murmur.
“Oh, if you want ME to play for you!” she said. “Yes, gladly. It will be merely absurd after what you heard this afternoon. I play like a hundred thousand other girls, and I like it. I’m glad when any one’s willing to listen, and if you—” She stopped, checked by a sudden recollection, and laughed ruefully. “But my piano won’t be here after to-night. I — I’m sending it away to-morrow. I’m afraid that if you’d like me to play to you you’d have to come this evening.”
“You’ll let me?” he cried.
“Certainly, if you care to.”
“If I could play—” he said, wistfully, “if I could play like that old man in the church I could thank you.”
“Ah, but you haven’t heard me play. I KNOW you liked this afternoon, but—”
“Yes,” said Bibbs. “It was the greatest happiness I’ve ever known.”
It was too dark to see his face, but his voice held such plain honesty, and he spoke with such complete unconsciousness of saying anything especially significant, that she knew it was the truth. For a moment she was nonplussed, then she opened the gate and went in. “You’ll come after dinner, then?”
“Yes,” he said, not moving. “Would you mind if I stood here until time to come in?”
She had reached the steps, and at that she turned, offering him the response of laughter and a gay gesture of her muff toward the lighted windows of the New House, as though bidding him to run home to his dinner.
That night, Bibbs sat writing in his note-book.
Music can come into a blank life, and fill it. Everything that
is beautiful is music, if you can listen.
There is no gracefulness like that of a graceful woman at a grand
piano. There is a swimming loveliness of line that seems to merge
with the running of the sound, and you seem, as you watch her, to
see what you are hearing and to hear what you are seeing.
There are women who make you think of pine woods coming down to
a sparkling sea. The air about such a woman is bracing, and when
she is near you, you feel strong and ambitious; you forget that
the world doesn’t like you. You think that perhaps you are a great
fellow, after all. Then you come away and feel like a boy who has
fallen in love with his Sunday-school teacher. You’ll be whipped
for it — and ought to be.
There are women who make you think of Diana, crowned with the moon.
But they do not have the “Greek profile.” I do not believe Helen
of Troy had a “Greek profile”; they would not have fought about her
if her nose had been quite that long. The Greek nose is not the
adorable nose. The adorable nose is about an eighth of an inch
shorter.
Much of the music of Wagner, it appears, is not suitable to the
piano. Wagner was a composer who could interpret into music such
things as the primitive impulses of humanity — he could have made a
machine-shop into music. But not if he had to work in it. Wagner
was always dealing in immensities — a machine-shop would have put a
majestic lump in so grand a gizzard as that.
There is a mystery about pianos, it seems. Sometimes they have to
be “sent away.” That is how some people speak of the penitentiary.
“Sent away” is a euphuism for “sent to prison.” But pianos are not
sent to prison, and they are not sent to the tuner — the tuner is
sent to them. Why are pianos “sent away” — and where?
Sometimes a glorious day shines into the most ordinary and useless
life. Happiness and beauty come caroling out of the air into the
gloomy house of that life as if some stray angel just happened to
perch on the roof-tree, resting and singing. And the night after
such a day is lustrous and splendid with the memory of it. Music
and beauty and kindness — those are the three greatest things God
can give us. To bring them all in one day to one who expected
nothing — ah! the heart that received them should be as humble as
it is thankful. But it is hard to be humble when one is so rich
with new memories. It is impossible to be humble after a day of
glory.
Yes — the adorable nose is more than an eighth of an inch shorter
than the Greek nose. It is a full quarter of an inch shorter.
There are women who will be kinder to a sick tramp than to a
conquering hero. But the sick tramp had better remember that’s
what he is. Take care, take care! Humble’s the word!
CHAPTER XVII
THAT “
MYSTERY ABOUT pianos” which troubled Bibbs had been a mystery to Mr. Vertrees, and it was being explained to him at about the time Bibbs scribbled the reference to it in his notes. Mary had gone up-stairs upon Bibbs’s departure at ten o’clock, and Mr. and Mrs. Vertrees sat until after midnight in the library, talking. And in all that time they found not one cheerful topic, but became more depressed with everything and with every phase of everything that they discussed — no extraordinary state of affairs in a family which has always “held up its head,” only to arrive in the end at a point where all it can do is to look on helplessly at the processes of its own financial dissolution. For that was the point which this despairing couple had reached — they could do nothing except look on and talk about it. They were only vaporing, and they knew it.
“She needn’t to have done that about her piano,” vapored Mr. Vertrees. “We could have managed somehow without it. At least she ought to have consulted me, and if she insisted I could have arranged the details with the — the dealer.”
“She thought that it might be — annoying for you,” Mrs. Vertrees explained. “Really, she planned for you not to know about it until they had removed — until after to-morrow, that is, but I decided to — to mention it. You see, she didn’t even tell me about it until this morning. She has another idea, too, I’m afraid. It’s — it’s—”
“Well?” he urged, as she found it difficult to go on.
“Her other idea is — that is, it was — I think it can be avoided, of course — it was about her furs.”
“No!” he exclaimed, quickly. “I won’t have it! You must see to that. I’d rather not talk to her about it, but you mustn’t let her.”
“I’ll try not,” his wife promised. “Of course, they’re very handsome.”
“All the more reason for her to keep them!” he returned, irritably. “We’re not THAT far gone, I think!”
“Perhaps not yet,” Mrs. Vertrees said. “She seems to be troubled about the — the coal matter and — about Tilly. Of course the piano will take care of some things like those for a while and—”
“I don’t like it. I gave her the piano to play on, not to—”
“You mustn’t be distressed about it in ONE way,” she said, comfortingly. “She arranged with the — with the purchaser that the men will come for it about half after five in the afternoon. The days are so short now it’s really quite winter.”
“Oh, yes,” he agreed, moodily. “So far as that goes people have a right to move a piece of furniture without stirring up the neighbors, I suppose, even by daylight. I don’t suppose OUR neighbors are paying much attention just now, though I hear Sheridan was back in his office early the morning after the funeral.”
Mrs. Vertrees made a little sound of commiseration. “I don’t believe that was because he wasn’t suffering, though. I’m sure it was only because he felt his business was so important. Mary told me he seemed wrapped up in his son’s succeeding; and that was what he bragged about most. He isn’t vulgar in his boasting, I understand; he doesn’t talk a great deal about his — his actual money — though there was something about blades of grass that I didn’t comprehend. I think he meant something about his energy — but perhaps not. No, his bragging usually seemed to be not so much a personal vainglory as about his family and the greatness of this city.”
“‘Greatness of this city’!” Mr. Vertrees echoed, with dull bitterness. “It’s nothing but a coal-hole! I suppose it looks ‘great’ to the man who has the luck to make it work for him. I suppose it looks ‘great’ to any YOUNG man, too, starting out to make his fortune out of it. The fellows that get what they want out of it say it’s ‘great,’ and everybody else gets the habit. But you have a different point of view if it’s the city that got what it wanted out of you! Of course Sheridan says it’s ‘great’.”
Mrs. Vertrees seemed unaware of this unusual outburst. “I believe,” she began, timidly, “he doesn’t boast of — that is, I understand he has never seemed so interested in the — the other one.”
Her husband’s face was dark, but at that a heavier shadow fell upon it; he looked more haggard than before. “‘The other one’,” he repeated, averting his eyes. “You mean — you mean the third son — the one that was here this evening?”
“Yes, the — the youngest,” she returned, her voice so feeble it was almost a whisper.
And then neither of them spoke for several long minutes. Nor did either look at the other during that silence.
At last Mr. Vertrees contrived to cough, but not convincingly. “What — ah — what was it Mary said about him out in the hall, when she came in this afternoon? I heard you asking her something about him, but she answered in such a low voice I didn’t — ah — happen to catch it.”
“She — she didn’t say much. All she said was this: I asked her if she had enjoyed her walk with him, and she said, ‘He’s the most wistful creature I’ve ever known.’”
“Well?”
“That was all. He IS wistful-looking; and so fragile — though he doesn’t seem quite so much so lately. I was watching Mary from the window when she went out to-day, and he joined her, and if I hadn’t known about him I’d have thought he had quite an interesting face.”
“If you ‘hadn’t known about him’? Known what?”
“Oh, nothing, of course,” she said, hurriedly. “Nothing definite, that is. Mary said decidely, long ago, that he’s not at all insane, as we thought at first. It’s only — well, of course it IS odd, their attitude about him. I suppose it’s some nervous trouble that makes him — perhaps a little queer at times, so that he can’t apply himself to anything — or perhaps does odd things. But, after all, of course, we only have an impression about it. We don’t know — that is, positively. I—” She paused, then went on: “I didn’t know just how to ask — that is — I didn’t mention it to Mary. I didn’t — I—” The poor lady floundered pitifully, concluding with a mumble. “So soon after — after the — the shock.”
“I don’t think I’ve caught more than a glimpse of him,” said Mr. Vertrees. “I wouldn’t know him if I saw him, but your impression of him is—” He broke off suddenly, springing to his feet in agitation. “I can’t imagine her — oh, NO!” he gasped. And he began to pace the floor. “A half-witted epileptic!”
“No, no!” she cried. “He may be all right. We—”
“Oh, it’s horrible! I can’t—” He threw himself back into his chair again, sweeping his hands across his face, then letting them fall limply at his sides.
Mrs. Vertrees was tremulous. “You mustn’t give way so,” she said, inspired for once almost to direct discourse. “Whatever Mary might think of doing, it wouldn’t be on her own account; it would be on ours. But if WE should — should consider it, that wouldn’t be on OUR own account. It isn’t because we think of ourselves.”
“Oh God, no!” he groaned. “Not for us! We can go to the poorhouse, but Mary can’t be a stenographer!”
Sighing, Mrs. Vertrees resumed her obliqueness. “Of course,” she murmured, “it all seems very premature, speculating about such things, but I had a queer sort of feeling that she seemed quite interested in this—” She had almost said “in this one,” but checked herself. “In this young man. It’s natural, of course; she is always so strong and well, and he is — he seems to be, that is — rather appealing to the — the sympathies.”
“Yes!” he agreed, bitterly. “Precisely. The sympathies!”
“Perhaps,” she faltered, “perhaps you might feel easier if I could have a little talk with some one?”
“With whom?”
“I had thought of — not going about it too brusquely, of course, but perhaps just waiting for his name to be mentioned, if I happened to be talking with somebody that knew the family — and then I might find a chance to say that I was sorry to hear he’d been ill so much, and — Something of that kind perhaps?”
“You don’t know anybody that knows the family.”
“Yes. That
is — well, in a way, of course, one OF the family. That Mrs. Roscoe Sheridan is not a — that is, she’s rather a pleasant-faced little woman, I think, and of course rather ordinary. I think she is interested about — that is, of course, she’d be anxious to be more intimate with Mary, naturally. She’s always looking over here from her house; she was looking out the window this afternoon when Mary went out, I noticed — though I don’t think Mary saw her. I’m sure she wouldn’t think it out of place to — to be frank about matters. She called the other day, and Mary must rather like her — she said that evening that the call had done her good. Don’t you think it might be wise?”
“Wise? I don’t know. I feel the whole matter is impossible.”
“Yes, so do I,” she returned, promptly. “It isn’t really a thing we should be considering seriously, of course. Still—”
“I should say not! But possibly—”
Thus they skirmished up and down the field, but before they turned the lights out and went up-stairs it was thoroughly understood between them that Mrs. Vertrees should seek the earliest opportunity to obtain definite information from Sibyl Sheridan concerning the mental and physical status of Bibbs. And if he were subject to attacks of lunacy, the unhappy pair decided to prevent the sacrifice they supposed their daughter intended to make of herself. Altogether, if there were spiteful ghosts in the old house that night, eavesdropping upon the woeful comedy, they must have died anew of laughter!
Mrs. Vertrees’s opportunity occurred the very next afternoon. Darkness had fallen, and the piano-movers had come. They were carrying the piano down the front steps, and Mrs. Vertrees was standing in the open doorway behind them, preparing to withdraw, when she heard a sharp exclamation; and Mrs. Roscoe Sheridan, bareheaded, emerged from the shadow into the light of the doorway.
“Good gracious!” she cried. “It did give me a fright!”
“It’s Mrs. Sheridan, isn’t it?” Mrs. Vertrees was perplexed by this informal appearance, but she reflected that it might be providential. “Won’t you come in?”
Collected Works of Booth Tarkington Page 172