Works of Robert W Chambers

by Robert W. Chambers

  So absorbed was she in her hammering that at first she neither heard nor saw Portlaw when he finally ventured to advance; and when she did she dropped the tack hammer in her astonishment.

  He dismounted, with pain, to pick it up, presented it, face wreathed in a series of appealing smiles, then, managing to scale the side of his horse again, settled himself as comfortably as possible for the impending conflict.

  But Alida Ascott, in her boyish riding breeches and deep-skirted coat, merely nodded her thanks, took hold of the hammer firmly, and drove in more tacks, paying no further attention to William Van Beuren Portlaw and his heart-rending smiles.

  It was very embarrassing; he sidled his horse around so that he might catch a glimpse of her profile. The view he obtained was not encouraging.

  “Alida,” he ventured plaintively.

  “Mr. Portlaw!” — so suddenly swinging on him that he lost all countenance and blurted out:

  “I — I only want to make amends and be friends.”

  “I expect you to make amends,” she said in a significantly quiet voice, which chilled him with the menace of damages unlimited. And even in his perturbation he saw at once that it would never do to have a backwoods jury look upon the fascinating countenance of this young plaintiff.

  “Alida,” he said sorrowfully, “I am beginning to see things in a clearer light.”

  “I think that light will grow very much clearer, Mr. Portlaw.”

  He repressed a shudder, and tried to look reproachful, but she seemed to be very hard-hearted, for she turned once more to her hammering.

  “Alida!”

  “What?” — continuing to drive tacks.

  “After all these years of friendship it — it is perfectly painful for me to contemplate a possible lawsuit—”

  “It will be more painful to contemplate an actual one, Mr. Portlaw.”

  “Alida, do you really mean that you — my neighbour and friend — are going to press this unnatural complaint?”

  “I certainly do.”

  Portlaw shook his head violently, and passed his gloved hand over his eyes as though to rouse himself from a distressing dream; all of which expressive pantomime was lost on Mrs. Ascott, who was busy driving tacks.

  “I simply cannot credit my senses,” he said mournfully.

  “You ought to try; it will be still more difficult later,” she observed, backing her horse so that she might inspect her handiwork from the proper point of view.

  Portlaw looked askance at the sign. It warned people not to shoot, fish, cut trees, dam streams, or build fires under penalty of the law; and was signed, “Alida Ascott.”

  “You didn’t have any up before, did you?” he asked innocently.

  “By advice of counsel I think I had better not reply, Mr. Portlaw. But I believe that point will be brought out by my lawyers — unless” — with a brilliant smile— “your own counsel sees fit to discuss it.”

  Portlaw was convinced that his hair was stirring under his cap. He was horribly afraid of the law.

  “See here, Alida,” he said, assuming the bluff rough-diamond front which the alarm in his eyes made foolish, “I want to settle this little difference and be friends with you again. I was wrong; I admit it.... Of course I might very easily defend such a suit—”

  “But, of course” — serenely undeceived— “as you admit you are in the wrong you will scarcely venture to defend such a suit. Your lawyers ought to forbid you to talk about this case, particularly” — with a demure smile— “to the plaintiff.”

  “Alida,” he said, “I am determined to remain your friend. You may do what you will, say what you wish, yes, even use my own words against me, but” — and virtue fairly exuded from every perspiring pore— “I will not retaliate!”

  “I’m afraid you can’t, William,” she said softly.

  “Won’t you — forgive?” he asked in a melting voice; but his eyes were round with apprehension.

  “There are some things that no woman can overlook,” she said.

  “I’ll send my men down to fix that bridge—”

  “Bridges can be mended; I was not speaking of the bridge.”

  “You mean those sheep—”

  “No, Mr. Portlaw.”

  “Well, there’s a lot — I mean that some little sand has been washed over your meadow—”

  “Good night,” she said, turning her horse’s head.

  “Isn’t it the sand, Alida?” he pleaded. “You surely will forgive that timber-cutting — and the shooting of a few migratory birds—”

  “Good night,” touching her gray mare forward to where he was awkwardly blocking the wood-path.... “Do you mind moving a trifle, Mr. Portlaw?”

  “About — ah — the — down there, you know, at Palm Beach,” he stammered, “at that accursed lawn-party—”

  “Yes?” She smiled but her eyes harboured lightning.

  “It was so hot in Florida — you know how infernally hot it was, don’t you, Alida?” he asked beseechingly. “I scarcely dared leave the Beach Club.”

  “Well?”

  “I — I thought I’d just m-m-mention it. That’s why I didn’t call on you — I was afraid of sunstroke—”

  “What!” she exclaimed, astonished at his stuttering audacity.

  He knew he was absurd, but it was all he could think of. She gave him time enough to realise the pitiable spectacle he was making of himself, sitting her horse motionless, pretty eyes bent on his — an almost faultless though slight figure, smooth as a girl’s yet faintly instinct with that charm of ripened adolescence just short of maturity.

  And, slowly, under her clear gaze, a confused comprehension began to stir in him — at first only a sort of chagrin, then something more — a consciousness of his own heaviness of intellect and grossness of figure — the fatness of mind and body which had developed so rapidly within the last two years.

  There she sat, as slim and pretty and fresh as ever; and only two years ago he had been mentally and physically active enough to find vigorous amusement in her company. Malcourt’s stinging words concerning his bodily unloveliness and self-centred inertia came into his mind; and a slow blush deepened the colour in his heavy face.

  What vanity he had reckoned on had deserted him along with any hope of compromising a case only too palpably against him. And yet, through the rudiments of better feeling awakening within him, the instinct of thrift still coloured his ideas a little.

  “I’m dead wrong, Alida. We might just as well save fees and costs and go over the damages together.... I’ll pay them. I ought to, anyway. I suppose I don’t usually do what I ought. Malcourt says I don’t — said so very severely — very mortifyingly the other day. So — if you’ll get him or your own men to decide on the amount—”

  “Do you think the amount matters?”

  “Oh, of course it’s principle; very proper of you to stand on your dignity—”

  “I am not standing on it now; I am listening to your utter misapprehension of me and my motives.... I don’t care for any — damages.”

  “It is perfectly proper for you to claim them, if,” he added cautiously, “they are within reason—”

  “Mr. Portlaw!”

  “What?” he asked, alarmed.

  “I would not touch a penny! I meant to give it to the schools, here — whatever I recovered.... Your misunderstanding of me is abominable!”

  He hung his head, heavy-witted, confused as a stupid schoolboy, feeling, helplessly, his clumsiness of mind and body.

  Something of this may have been perceptible to her — may have softened her ideas concerning him — ideas which had accumulated bitterness during the year of his misbehaviour and selfish neglect. Her instinct divined in his apparently sullen attitude the slow intelligence and mental perturbation of a wilful, selfish boy made stupid through idleness and self-indulgence. Even what had been clean-cut, attractive, in his face and figure was being marred and coarsened by his slothful habits to an extent that secretly
dismayed her; for she had always thought him very handsome; and, with that natural perversity of selection, finding in him a perfect foil to her own character, had been seriously inclined to like him.

  Attractions begin in that way, sometimes, where the gentler is the stronger, the frailer, the dominant character; and the root is in the feminine instinct to care for, develop, and make the most of what palpably needs a protectorate.

  Without comprehending her own instinct, Mrs. Ascott had found the preliminary moulding of Portlaw an agreeable diversion; had rather taken for granted that she was doing him good; and was correspondingly annoyed when he parted his moorings and started drifting aimlessly as a derelict scow awash, floundering seaward without further notice of the trim little tug standing by and amiably ready to act as convoy.

  Now, sitting her saddle in silence she surveyed him, striving to understand him — his recent indifference, his deterioration, the present figure he was cutting. And it seemed to her a trifle sad that he had no one to tell him a few wholesome truths.

  “Mr. Portlaw,” she said, “do you know that you have been exceedingly rude to me?”

  “Yes, I — do know it.”

  “Why?” she asked simply.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Didn’t you care for our friendship? Didn’t it amuse and interest you? How could you have done the things you did — in the way you did?... If you had asked my permission to build a dozen dams I’d have given it. Didn’t you know it? But my self-respect protested when you so cynically ignored me—”

  “I’m a beast all right,” he muttered.

  She gazed at him, softened, even faintly amused at his repentant bad-boy attitude.

  “Do you want me to forgive you, Mr. Portlaw?”

  “Yes — but you oughtn’t.”

  “That is quite true.... Turn your horse and ride back with me. I’m going to find out exactly how repentant you really are.... If you pass a decent examination you may dine with Miss Palliser, Mr. Wayward, and me. It’s too late anyway to return through the forest.... I’ll send you over in the motor.”

  And as they wheeled and walked their horses forward through the dusk, she said impulsively:

  “We have four for Bridge if you like.”

  “Alida,” he said sincerely, “you are a corker.”

  She looked up demurely. What she could see to interest her in this lump of a man Heaven alone knew, but a hint of the old half-patient, half-amused liking for him and his slow wits began to flicker once more. De gustibus — alas!

  CHAPTER XXIV

  THE SCHOOL OF THE RECRUIT

  When Portlaw arrived home late that evening there existed within his somewhat ordinary intellect a sense of triumph. The weak usually experience it at the beginning and through every step of their own subjugation.

  Malcourt, having decided to take an express which stopped on signal at six in the morning, was reading as usual before the empty fireplace; and at the first glance he suspected what had begun to happen to Portlaw.

  The latter bustled about the room with an air of more or less importance, sorted his letters, fussed with a newspaper; and every now and then Malcourt, glancing up, caught Portlaw’s eyes peeping triumphantly around corners at him.

  “You’ve been riding?” he said, much amused. “Are you stiff?”

  “A trifle,” replied the other carelessly. “I must keep it up. Really, you know, I’ve rather neglected the horses lately.”

  “Rather. So you’re taking up riding again?”

  Portlaw nodded: “I’ve come to the conclusion that I need exercise.”

  Malcourt, who had been urging him for years to exercise, nodded approval as though the suggestion were a brand-new one.

  “Yes,” said Portlaw, “I shall ride, I think, every day. I intend to do a good bit of tramping, too. It’s excellent for the liver, Louis.”

  At this piece of inspired information Malcourt assumed an expression of deepest interest, but hoped Portlaw might not overdo it.

  “I’m going to diet, too,” observed Portlaw, watching the effect of this astounding statement on his superintendent. “My theory is that we all eat too much.”

  “Don’t do anything Spartan,” said Malcourt warningly; “a man at your time of life—”

  “My — what! Confound it, Louis, I’m well this side of forty!”

  “Yes, perhaps; but when a man reaches your age there is not much left for him but the happiness of overeating—”

  “What d’y’ mean?”

  “Nothing; only as he’s out of the race with younger men as far as a pretty woman is concerned—”

  “Who’s out!” demanded Portlaw, red in the face. “What sort of men do you suppose interest women? Broilers? I always thought your knowledge of women was superficial; now I know it. And you don’t know everything about everything else, either — about summonses and lawsuits, for example.” And he cast an exultant look at his superintendent.

  But Malcourt let him tell the news in his own way; and he did, imparting it in bits with naive enjoyment, apparently utterly unconscious that he was doing exactly what his superintendent had told him to do.

  “You are a diplomat, aren’t you?” said Malcourt with a weary smile.

  “A little, a little,” admitted Portlaw modestly. “I merely mentioned these things—” He waved his hand to check any possible eulogy of himself from Malcourt. “I’ll merely say this: that when I make up my mind to settle anything—” He waved his hand again, condescendingly.

  “That man,” thought Malcourt, “will be done for in a year. Any woman could have had him; the deuce of it was to find one who’d take him. I think she’s found.”

  And looking up blandly:

  “Porty, old fellow, you’re really rather past the marrying age—”

  “I’ll do what I please!” shouted Portlaw, exasperated.

  Malcourt had two ways of making Portlaw do a thing; one was to tell him not to, the other the reverse. He always ended by doing it anyway; but the quicker result was obtained by the first method.

  So Malcourt went to New York next morning convinced that Portlaw’s bachelor days were numbered; aware, also, that as soon as Mrs. Ascott took the helm his own tenure of office would promptly expire. He wished it to expire, easily, agreeably, naturally; and that is why he had chosen to shove Portlaw in the general direction of the hymeneal altar.

  He did not care very much for Portlaw — scarcely enough to avoid hurting his feelings by abandoning him. But now he had arranged it so that to all appearances the abandoning would be done by Portlaw, inspired by the stronger mind of Mrs. Ascott. It had been easy and rather amusing to arrange; it saved wordy and endless disputes with Portlaw; it would give him a longed-for release from an occupation he had come to hate.

  Malcourt was tired. He wanted a year of freedom from dependence, surcease of responsibility — a year to roam where he wished, foregather with whom he pleased, haunt the places congenial to him, come and go unhampered; a year of it — only one year. What remained for him to do after the year had expired he thought he understood; yes, he was practically certain — had always been.

  But first must come that wonderful year he had planned — or, if he tired of the pleasure sooner, then, as the caprice stirred him, he would do what he had planned to do ever since his father died. The details only remained to be settled.

  For Malcourt, with all the contradictions in his character, all his cynicism, effrontery, ruthlessness, preferred to do things in a manner calculated to spare the prejudices of others; and if there was a way to accomplish a thing without hurting people, he usually took the trouble to do it in that way. If not, he did it anyway.

  And now, at last, he saw before him the beginning of that curious year for which he had so long waited; and, concerning the closing details of which, he had pondered so often with his dark, handsome head lowered and slightly turned, listening, always listening.

  But nothing of this had he spoken of to his wife. It was not n
ecessary. He had a year in which to live in a certain manner and do a certain thing; and it was going to amuse him to do it in a way which would harm nobody.

  The year promised to be an interesting one, to judge from all signs. For one item his sister, Lady Tressilvain, was impending from Paris — also his brother-in-law — complicating the humour of the visitation. Malcourt’s marriage to an heiress was the perfectly obvious incentive of the visit. And when they wrote that they were coming to New York, it amused Malcourt exceedingly to invite them to Luckless Lake. But he said nothing about it to Portlaw or his wife.

  Then, for another thing, the regeneration and development, ethically and artistically, of Dolly Wilming amused him. He wanted to be near enough to watch it — without, however, any real faith in its continuation.

  And, also, there was Miss Suydam. Her development would not be quite as agreeable to witness; process of disillusioning her, little by little, until he had undermined himself sufficiently to make the final break with her very easy — for her. Of course it interested him; all intrigue did where skill was required with women.

  And, last of all, yet of supreme importance, he desired leisure, undisturbed, to study his own cumulative development, to humorously thwart it, or misunderstand it, or slyly aid it now and then — always aware of and attentive to that extraneous something which held him so motionless, at moments, listening attentively as though to a command.

  For, from that morning four years ago when, crushed with fatigue, he strove to keep his vigil beside his father who, toward daybreak, had been feigning sleep — from that dreadful dawn when, waking with the crash of the shot in his ears, his blinded gaze beheld the passing of a soul — he understood that he was no longer his own master.

  Not that the occult triad, Chance, Fate, and Destiny ruled; they only modified his orbit. But from the centre of things Something that ruled them was pulling him toward it, slowly, steadily, inexorably drawing him nearer, lessening the circumference of his path, attenuating it, circumscribing, limiting, controlling. And long since he had learned to name this thing, undismayed — this one thing remaining in the world in which his father’s son might take a sporting interest.