Works of Robert W Chambers

by Robert W. Chambers

  He said airily: “A country ramble with a pretty girl is always agreeable to me. I’ll come if you’ll let me.”

  She looked up at him, perplexed, undecided.

  “Are you making fun of Brooklyn, or of me?”

  “Of neither. May I come?”

  “If you care to,” she said.

  They walked on together up Fulton Street, following the stream of returning sight-seers and business men, passing recruiting stations where red-legged infantry of the 14th city regiment stood in groups reading the extras just issued by the Eagle and Brooklyn Times concerning the bloody riot in Baltimore and the attack on the 6th Massachusetts. Everywhere, too, soldiers of the 13th, 38th, and 70th regiments of city infantry, in blue state uniforms, were marching about briskly, full of the business of recruiting and of their departure, which was scheduled for the twenty-third of April.

  Already the complexion of the Brooklyn civic sidewalk crowds was everywhere brightened by military uniforms; cavalrymen of the troop of dragoons attached to the 8th New York, jaunty lancers from the troop of lancers attached to the 69th New York, riflemen in green epaulettes and facings, zouaves in red, blue, and brown uniforms came hurrying down the stony street to Fulton Ferry on their return from witnessing a parade of the 14th Brooklyn at Fort Greene. And every figure in uniform thrilled the girl with suppressed excitement and pride.

  Berkley, eyeing them askance, began blandly:

  ”Citizens of martial minds,

  Uniforms of wondrous kinds,

  Wonderful the sights we see —

  Ailsa, you’ll agree with me.”

  “Are you utterly without human feeling?” she demanded. “Because, if you are, there isn’t the slightest use of my pretending to be civil to you any longer.”

  “Have you been pretending?”

  “I suppose you think me destitute of humour,” she said, “but there is nothing humourous about patriotism and self-sacrifice to me, and nothing very admirable about those who mock it.”

  Her cheeks were deeply flushed; she looked straight ahead of her as she walked beside him.

  Yet, even now the swift little flash of anger revealed an inner glimpse to her of her unaltered desire to know this man; of her interest in him — of something about him that attracted her but defied analysis — or had defied it until, pursuing it too far one day, she had halted suddenly and backed away.

  Then, curiously, reflectively, little by little, she retraced her steps. And curiosity urged her to investigate in detail the Four Fears — fear of the known in another, fear of the unknown in another, fear of the known in one’s self, fear of the unknown in one’s self. That halted her again, for she knew now that it was something within herself that threatened her. But it was his nearness to her that evoked it.

  For she saw, now that her real inclination was to be with him, that she had liked him from the first, had found him agreeable — pleasant past belief — and that, although there seemed to be no reason for her liking, no excuse, nothing to explain her half-fearful pleasure in his presence, and her desire for it, she did desire it. And for the first time since her widowhood she felt that she had been living her life out along lines that lay closer to solitude than to the happy freedom of which she had reluctantly dreamed locked in the manacles of a loveless marriage.

  For her marriage had been one of romantic pity, born of the ignorance of her immaturity; and she was very young when she became the wife of Warfield Paige — Celia’s brother — a gentle, sweet-tempered invalid, dreamy, romantic, and pitifully confident of life, the days of which were already numbered.

  Of the spiritual passions she knew a little — of the passion of pity, of consent, of self-sacrifice, of response to spiritual need. But neither in her early immaturity nor in later adolescence had she ever before entertained even the most innocent inclination for a man. Man’s attractions, physical and personal, had left only the lightest of surface impressions — until the advent of this man.

  To what in him was she responsive? What intellectual charm had he revealed? What latent spiritual excellence did she suspect? What were his lesser qualities — the simpler moral virtues — the admirable attributes which a woman could recognise. Nay, where even were the nobler failings, the forgivable faults, the promise of future things?

  Her uplifted, questioning eyes searched and fell. Only the clear-cut beauty of his head answered her, only the body’s grace.

  She sometimes suspected pity as her one besetting sin. Was it pity for this man — a young man only twenty-four, her own age, so cheerful under the crushing weight of material ruin? Was it his poverty that appealed?

  Was it her instinct to protect? If all she heard was true, he sorely needed protection from himself. For tales of him had filtered to her young ears — indefinite rumours of unworthy things — of youth wasted and manhood threatened — of excesses incomprehensible to her, and to those who hinted them to her.

  Was it his solitude in the world for which she was sorry? She had no parents, either. But she had their house and their memories concrete in every picture, every curtain, every chair and sofa. Twilight whispered of them through every hallway, every room; dawn was instinct with their unseen spirits, sweetening everything in the quiet old house. . . . And that day she had learned where he lived. And she dared not imagine how.

  They turned together into the quiet, tree-shaded street, and, in the mellow sunset light, something about it, and the pleasant vine-hung house, and the sense of restfulness moved her with a wistful impulse that he, too, should share a little of the home welcome that awaited her from her own kin.

  “Will you remain and dine with us, Mr. Berkley?”

  He looked up, so frankly surprised at her kindness that it hurt her all through.

  “I want to be friends with you,” she said impulsively. “Didn’t you know it?”

  They had halted at the foot of the stoop.

  “I should think you could see how easy it would he for us to become friends,” she said with pretty self-possession. But her heart was beating violently.

  His pulses, too, were rapping out a message to his intelligence:

  “You had better not go in,” it ran. “You are not fit to go in.

  You had better keep away from her. You know what will happen if

  you don’t.”

  As they entered the house her sister-in-law rose from the piano in the front parlour and came forward.

  “Were you worried, dearest?” cried Ailsa gaily. “I really couldn’t help it. And Mr. Berkley lost his hat, and I’ve brought him back to dinner.”

  CHAPTER VII

  To Berkley the times were surcharged with agreeable agitation. A hullabaloo diverted him. He himself was never noisy; but agitated and noisy people always amused him.

  Day after day the city’s multi-coloured militia regiments passed through its echoing streets; day after day Broadway resounded with the racket of their drums. Rifles, chasseurs, zouaves, foot artillery, pioneers, engineers, rocket batteries, the 79th Highlanders, dismounted lancers of the 69th and dragoons of the 8th — every heard-of and unheard-of unnecessary auxiliary to a respectable regiment of state infantry, mustered for inspection and marched away in polychromatic magnificence. Park, avenue, and square shrilled with their windy fifes; the towering sides of the transports struck back the wild music of their bands; Castle William and Fort Hamilton saluted them from the ferries to the Narrows; and, hoarse with cheering, the people stared through dim eyes till the last stain of smoke off Sandy Hook vanished seaward. All of which immensely diverted Berkley.

  The city, too, had become a thoroughfare for New England and Western troops hurrying pell-mell toward the capital and that unknown bourne so vaguely defined as the “seat of war.” Also all avenues were now dotted with barracks and recruiting stations, around which crowds clamoured. Fire Zouaves, Imperial Zouaves, National Zouaves, Billy Wilson’s Zouaves appropriated without ceremony the streets and squares as drill grounds. All day long they manoeuvred an
d double-quicked; all day and all night herds of surprised farm horses destined for cavalry, light artillery, and glory, clattered toward the docks; files of brand-new army waggons, gun-carriages, smelling of fresh paint, caissons, forges, ambulances bound South checked the city traffic and added to the city’s tumult as they jolted in hundreds and hundreds toward the wharves — materially contributing to Berkley’s entertainment.

  Beginning with the uproarious war meeting in Union Square, every day saw its crowds listening to the harangue of a somebody or a nobody. Sometimes short, ugly demonstrations were made against an unpopular newspaper office or the residence of an unpopular citizen; the police were rough and excitable, the nerves of the populace on edge, the city was now nearly denuded of its militia, and everybody was very grateful for the temporary presence of volunteer regiments in process of formation.

  As yet the tension of popular excitement had not jaded the capacity of the city for pleasure. People were ready for excitement, welcomed it after the dreadful year of lethargy. Stocks fell, but the theatres were the fuller; Joseph Jefferson at Winter Garden, Wallack at his own theatre, “The Seven Sisters” at Laura Keene’s, drew unsatisfied crowds, galloping headlong on the heels of pleasure.

  Philharmonics, plays, burlesques, concerts, minstrel entertainments, never lacked audiences, especially when the proceeds were destined for the Union Defence Committee; the hotels, Bancroft, St. Nicholas, Metropolitan, New York, Fifth Avenue, were all brilliantly thronged at night; cafes and concert halls like the Gaieties, Canterbury, and American, flourished and flaunted their advertisements; grills, restaurants, saloons, multiplied. There were none too many for Berkley’s amusement.

  As yet no battle lightning flickered along the Southern horizon to sober folk with premonition; but the nightly illumination of the metropolis was becoming tinged with a more sinister reflection where licence had already begun to lift a dozen hydra-heads from certain lurid resorts hitherto limited in number and in impudence.

  It was into the streets of such a city, a meaner, dirtier, uglier, noisier, perhaps more vicious edition of the French metropolis of the Third Empire, thronged with fantastic soldiery and fox-eyed contractors, filled already with new faces — faces of Western born, Yankee born, foreign born; stupid faces, crafty faces, hard faces, bedizened faces — it was into the streets of such a city that Berkley sauntered twice a day to and fro from his office, regretting only that his means did not permit him to go to the devil like a gentleman.

  And one day, out of the hurly-burly, and against all laws of probability and finance, an incredible letter was handed to him. And he read it, standing by his window, and calmly realised that he was now no longer penniless.

  Some inspired idiot had become a credulous market for his apparently unmarketable securities. Who this person was his brokers did not say; but, whoever it was, had bought every rotten share he held; and there was money for him in the world to help him out of it.

  As he stood there, the letter in his hands, drums sounded across the street, and Stephen came in from the outer office.

  “Another regiment,” he said. “Do you know where they come from?”

  Berkley shook his head, and they went to the windows; below them surged the flood of dead wood driven before the oncoming waves — haggard men, ragged men, small boys, darkies, Bowery b’hoys, stray red-shirted firemen, then the police, then solid double ranks of drums battered by flashing, brass-bound drumsticks, then line after line of blue and steel, steadily flowing through the streets and away, away into the unknown.

  “How young they are!” muttered Farren, the gray-haired cashier, standing behind Stephen’s shoulders. “God bless me, they’re children!”

  “It’s a Vermont regiment,” said Berkley; “they’re filing out of the Park Barracks. What a lot of hawk-nosed, hatchet-faced, turkey-necked cow milkers! — all heroes, too, Steve. You can tell that because they’re in uniform and carry guns.”

  Stephen watched the lank troops, fascinated by the long, silent, almost gliding stride of officers and men loaded down with knapsack, blanket, and canteen, their caps pushed high on their red and sweating foreheads. There was a halt; big hands, big red knuckles, big feet, and the delicate curve of the hawk’s beak outlining every Yankee nose, queer, humourous, restless glances sweeping Gotham streets and windows where Gotham crowded to gaze back at the halted youngsters in blue; then a far tenor cry, nasal commands, thin voices penetrating from out of the crowded distance; a sudden steadying of ranks; the level flash of shouldered steel; a thousand men marking time; and at last the drums’ quick outbreak; and the 1st Vermont Infantry passed onward into the unknown.

  “I’d rather like to go there — to see what there is there,” observed

  Berkley.

  “Where?”

  “Where they’re going — wherever that may be — and I think I know.”

  He glanced absently at his letter again.

  “I’ve sold some stock — all I had, and I’ve made a lot of money,” he said listlessly.

  Stephen dropped an impulsive hand on his shoulder.

  “I’m terribly glad, Berkley! I’m delighted!” he said with a warmth that brought a slight colour into Berkley’s face.

  “That’s nice of you, Stephen. It solves the immediate problem of how to go there.”

  “Go where?”

  “Why — where all our bright young men are going, old fellow,” said

  Berkley, laughing. “I can go with a regiment or I can go alone.

  But I really must be starting.”

  “You mean to enlist?”

  “Yes, it can be done that way, too. Or — other ways. The main thing is to get momentum. . . . I think I’ll just step out and say good-bye and many thanks to your father. I shall be quite busy for the rest of my career.”

  “You are not leaving here?”

  “I am. But I’ll pay my rent first,” said Berkley, laughing.

  And go he did that very afternoon; and the office of Craig & Son knew him no more.

  A few days later Ailsa Paige returned to New York and reoccupied her own house on London Terrace.

  A silk flag drooped between the tall pilasters. Under it, at the front door stood Colonel Arran to welcome her. It had been her father’s house; he had planted the great catalpa trees on the grassy terrace in front. Here she had been born; from here she had gone away a bride; from here her parents had been buried, both within that same strange year that left her widowed who had scarcely been a wife. And to this old house she had returned alone in her sombre weeds — utterly alone, in her nineteenth year.

  This man had met her then as he met her now; she remembered it, remembered, too, that after any absence, no matter how short, this old friend had always met her at her own door-sill, standing aside with head bent as she crossed the sill.

  Now she gave him both hands.

  “It is so kind of you, dear Colonel Arran! It would not be a home-coming without you—” And glancing into the hall, nodded radiantly to the assembled servants — her parents’ old and privileged and spoiled servants gathered to welcome the young mistress to her own.

  “Oh — and there’s Missy!” she said, as an inquiring “meow!” sounded close to her skirts. “You irresponsible little thing — I suppose you have more kittens. Has she, Susan?”

  “Five m’m,” said Susan drily.

  “Oh, dear, I suppose it can’t be avoided. But we mustn’t drown any, you know.” And with one hand resting on Colonel Arran’s arm she began a tour of the house to inspect the new improvements.

  Later they sat together amid the faded splendours of the southern drawing-room, where sunshine regilded cornice and pier glass, turned the lace curtains to nets of gold, and streaked the red damask hangings with slanting bars of fire.

  Shiftless old Jonas shuffled in presently with the oval silver tray, ancient decanters, and seedcakes.

  And here, over their cakes and Madeira, she told him about her month’s visit to the Craigs’; abou
t her life in the quaint and quiet city, the restful, old-fashioned charm of the cultivated circles on Columbia Heights and the Hill; the attractions of a limited society, a little dull, a little prim, pedantic, perhaps provincially simple, but a society caring for the best in art, in music, in literature, instinctively recognising the best although the best was nowhere common in the city.

  She spoke of the agreeable people she had met — unobtrusive, gentle-mannered folk whose homes may have lacked such Madeira and silver as this, but lacked nothing in things of the mind.

  She spoke of her very modest and temporary duties in church work there, and in charities; told of the advent of the war news and its effect on the sister city.

  And at last, casually, but without embarrassment, she mentioned

  Berkley.

  Colonel Arran’s large hand lay along the back of the Virginia sofa, fingers restlessly tracing and retracing the carved foliations supporting the horns of plenty. His heavy, highly coloured head was lowered and turned aside a little as though to bring one ear to bear on what she was saying.

  “Mr. Berkley seems to be an — unusual man,” she ventured. “Do you happen to know him, Colonel Arran?”

  “Slightly.”

  “Oh. Did you know his parents?”

  “His mother.”

  “She is not living, I believe.”

  “No.”

  “Is his father living?”

  “I — don’t know.”

  “You never met him?”

  Colonel Arran’s forefinger slowly outlined the deeply carved horn of plenty.

  “I am not perfectly sure that I ever met Mr. Berkley’s father.”

  She sat, elbows on the table, gazing reflectively into space.

  “He is a — curious — man.”

  “Did you like him?” asked Colonel Arran with an effort.

  “Yes,” she said, so simply that the Colonel’s eyes turned directly toward her, lingered, then became fixed on the sunlit damask folds behind her.

  “What did you like about Mr. Berkley, Ailsa?”