The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Mayor of New York
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.
Title: The Mayor of New York
A romance of days to come
Author: L. P. Gratacap
Illustrator: Joseph Cummings Chase
Release date: September 9, 2026 [eBook #79541]
Language: English
Original publication: New York: G. W. Dillingham Company, 1910
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79541
Credits: Tim Lindell, Andrew Scott, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MAYOR OF NEW YORK ***
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE Some minor changes to the text are noted at the
end of the book.
Italic text is denoted by _underscores_
Small capitals changed to all capitals
[Illustration: “IF YOU WILL ARGUE THIS MATTER WITH GUNS, YOU SHALL BE
ANSWERED WITH GUNS.” _Frontispiece. Page 440._]
THE
Mayor of New York
_A Romance of Days to Come_
BY
L. P. GRATACAP
Author of “The Certainty of a Future Life in Mars,”
“A Woman of the Ice Age,” “The
Evacuation of England.”
[Illustration: circular illustration of a wax seal or coin]
G. W. DILLINGHAM COMPANY
PUBLISHERS NEW YORK
_Copyright, 1910, By_
G. W. DILLINGHAM COMPANY
THE MAYOR OF NEW YORK
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. Tom Ratler 9
II. Helen Lorimer 28
III. A Dinner in Carrara 48
IV. The Suicidarium 65
V. The Mayor 88
VI. The Beehive 110
VII. The Mayor’s Visit 135
VIII. The Chariot of Flight 168
IX. The Cardinal 195
X. The Mayor’s Courtship 225
XI. Amato’s Courtship 259
XII. The Trial 290
XIII. The Trial (continued) 321
XIV. The Great Riots 338
XV. An Up-to-Date Rescue 377
XVI. The Mayor’s Death 409
XVII. The Pope comes to America 447
ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
“IF YOU WILL ARGUE THIS MATTER WITH GUNS, YOU SHALL BE
ANSWERED WITH GUNS” _Frontispiece_ 440
“PAIN, PAIN, PAIN; NOTHING BUT PAIN” 79
“NO FUNNY BUSINESS, OR UP YOU GO IN SMOKE” 120
“HOW WONDERFULLY YOU HAVE INSPIRED ME” 240
THE MAYOR OF NEW YORK
CHAPTER I
TOM RATLER
It was a picture of wonderful beauty, with elements strangely
transporting. The sky was clear, with vaporous vestiges of a thunder
storm, whose dark draperies of lightning stricken depths lay
effectively on the southern horizon; the moon was at its full, and
its unimpeded rays burnished the waters of the harbor with a silver
splendor. A group of men and women on the upper and forward deck
of an incoming steamer were the silent spectators of this scene as
the steamer lay anchored towards the New Jersey shore of the harbor
of New York in the coming year of grace 2000, and as the lingering
spring, with an already lost freshness, was passing into the warmer
flushes of the summer. The margins of that great bay which once at
such a time had been dark with the clustering volumes of leaves
upon the arms of encircling forests, was now girdled with a zone of
artificial light. It did not encroach upon the domain of the moon’s
regnancy, but it seemed to throb nebulous and soft upon all those
shores like a titanic wheel of fire. It represented the last triumph
of electrical science. It was an electrification of the air above
the cities, and that air was palpitating with shooting wreaths of
color that gave, for each changing instant, a new festal brilliancy.
The gazers were shocked into an admiring astonishment, which only
had an audible expression in murmurs of delight, or took the form of
appreciative exclamations.
The particular glory of this crown of illumination over the cities
about the harbor was its irregular surface or outline. Above the
island of New York it rose far up into the outer spaces, burning with
an exquisite rosiness; above Staten Island, where it was carried
still higher, the color was a strangely mutable blue, and over
the lower regions of Long Island and New Jersey it lay in auroral
sheets, that every now and then, with a billowy exhalation, shot up
phosphorescent projections that seemed actually to detach themselves,
and float away like luminous clouds. It gave a spectral splendor
to everything and on the deck of the steamer, and at the feet of
the mute on-lookers its reflections for an instant shimmered and
vanished. But the moon, unchecked by this terrestrial rival, shone
on, and its limpid refulgence on the faintly rippling waters lost
none of its charm, in contrast with the schemes of artifice around
it. In the penumbral glory dark lines appeared, which may have been
unilluminated and cavernous streets, while its changing lustres
revealed many a towering turret, especially over Staten Island and
New York island, and terraces of light marked the arched bridges and
their precipitous piers, over the East and North rivers.
The steamer, whose occupants thought they had arrived at some
celestial fairy land, was a coast wise “tramp,” and had steamed
from Portland, Maine, with a cargo of stone and lumber. Among
its passengers was a sturdy youth from the lumber lands of that
state—lumber lands which yet, with decreasing resources, strove to
supply the markets—who had stolen away from home, and determined
to try the tempestuous and stirring arena of the huge metropolis,
that now, at the dawn of the twenty-first century, expressing the
awfully expanded powers of man over material things, expressed too
his illimitable luxury, and held within its area an unfathomable
possibility of strife and devastating conflict; a city that had
become the centre of the world of thought, confining the seething
tides of a radicalism that pushed forward a militant atheism against
the still struggling standards of the Church; wherein too lay the
ripe and bursting seeds of an ambitious artistry that would scale
the heavens and reincarnate the flesh of man in an immortal youth,
while it lit all the torches of a brazen defiance of the moral law.
Tom Ratler had heard of this tremendous city, and his blood boiled
to meet its intoxications and his mind delighted in the dream that
he might scale its dazzling heights, and linger long beneath the
canopies of its indulgences. He possessed those things which go to
make the conquering man, pride, courage, an instinctive readiness
in danger, a supple mind, a compelling passion dressed in all the
allurements of a strong and noble form, his voice had chime and music
in it, and a certain spirited demeanor held attention and enforced
respect, and all this not unreasonably yoked with judgment and no
inconsiderable self-control.
Tom had been born in the Aroostook country of his native state, and
had lived the fresh healthful life of the fields. He had availed
himself of the advantages of a high school, had read, and, belonging
to a farmer family of excellent reputation and commercial prestige,
wore the garb of good manners, and listened to the incentives of good
taste. His mother was a woman of exceptional purity of heart, and
his father a rugged Ajax skilled in extemporaneous prayer, and not
unskillful in hammering an opponent to the ground. Tom was a young
giant perfectly moulded. His size did not surpass natural limits of
comeliness, but it filled with caution its unlucky antagonist. His
face was fair, and the rounded bullet-head not strikingly expressive
of scholarship—was sheathed in crisply curled hair like a Grecian
Apollo, his mouth broad and ingratiating held an armory of ivory
teeth—the charm of all mouths—and his eyes of chestnut, were sweet
and tempting, by the side of a straight nose and beneath a just
obviously receding forehead which however was a little narrow, while
at the union of the nose and forehead, a depression gathered a few
lines of tension around these formative kernels of flesh and bone,
which, to the phrenologist are the signals of observation.
None among those on the deck of the Barrymore had been more
astonished with the miracle of science and loveliness before
them than Tom, and he thirsted eagerly to reach this prospect of
delectation, and plunge into its weaving web of life confusion and
intrigue. As he leaned over the rail gloatingly feeding his eyes
on this vision of delight, and somewhat apart from the others, he
heard, and then he noticed a movement at the stern of the boat,
and on the side, which was followed by the swish of oars and the
emergent outlines of a row boat. He ran down the rail and whistled
softly. The next instant the row boat was alongside revealed from
stem to stern in the moonlight, with one figure in it, a Whitehall
fisherman or “dockrat,” who was looking for such chance opportunities
of profit as a newly arrived ship afforded in passengers, freight,
errands, or—less meritoriously—in “smuggle.” His keen ear had caught
the sibilant invitation of Tom, and he quickly brought his little
boat immediately beneath that interested person’s observation. Tom
whispered to him to “wait,” and then hastily disappeared, returning
in a few moments with his modest dress suit case, which vanished
as quickly as it had come over the side of the ship, and was
unceremoniously succeeded by its owner, the latter making use of a
loose rope fastened to the taffrail of the steamer. The row boat shot
out into clear water, and Tom then became the object of expostulation
and entreaty on the part of his former companions, who no less
eagerly than himself, wished to reach the planetary wonder before
them. Tom paid slight attention to these remonstrances, and urged his
guide to renewed efforts, while he seized an unused pair of oars, and
added an impetuous speed to the rocking and arrowy motion.
But Tom’s participation did not last longer than was necessary to
bring him closer to the docks of the city. Then he drew in his oars,
retired to the stern of the boat, and looked around him. And need
he had for he was within the scope of the opalescent marvel, and its
stupendous loveliness alternately crushed him with amazement, or
roused him to enthusiasm. His position may be understood from a few
contemporaneous land-marks.
The dancing row boat lay in that criss-crossed and vexed acre near
Governor’s Island, where the quarreling tides of the East and Hudson
rivers form a patch of troubled waters. On Tom’s right hand was the
island, now kept as a military reservation, but one hundred years
later forested and mantled with flowers, marked with paths, and
surmounted—in the old Fort Hancock—by a conservatory, while the
ancient keep of Castle William still remained, embraced in climbing
vines, with its roof converted into a garden of roses. On his left
the flaming pharos on Bedlow’s Island still burned, but in the hand
of the colossal figure there was no longer an electric star, but she
held a torch of flaming gas, whose long, wayward threads of fire the
winds now hurried upward, now stretched in horizontal films. Near
this dramatic station the immigration buildings on Ellis Island were
seen framed in light, and thence northward in all directions, along
the great rivers and in the median zone of Manhattan, tall structures
climbed upward, now dark by reason of the desertion of their human
households, but bathed over their summits with the descending rays
of that incredible aurora that filled the air above them. It was yet
early evening, and immediately in the foreground of this nocturnal
spectacle, was the old Battery park twinkling with lamps, in the
intervals of a renewed forestation which made it a dark spot on the
water’s edge, yet crisply dipt in a silver bath, that came from the
moon, mingled with a penumbral halo that came from the electric
arc far above it. Tom could now see the reason for the irregular
elevation of the luminous ceiling over the city. It was due to the
varying heights of the tall buildings that seemed to climb into the
skies.
The refulgence was also not everywhere; he could see that over broad
spaces of the peopled shores in Brooklyn and New York black lacunae
occurred where the shining curtain was absent. The boat had pushed
its way through the strife of waters and was nearing the little
Whitehall basin which then as now, afforded a retreat and harbor to
the battery boatman. Tom overwhelmed his pilot with a generous fare,
and jumped quickly to the landing, hurried up the stone stairs, and
was in New York, ready for adventure, not disinclined for mischief,
and fully committed to the wayward guidance of his fancies and his
fortune. His heart glowed with delight, and his mind leaped forward
in anticipations of forming a part in that shifting scene, which had
drawn to it the eyes of the world, for here again, as in ancient Rome
a tumult of social collisions had arisen, mingling with miscellaneous
and picturesque confusion with the last expressions of mechanical and
architectural daring, with the fevered promotions of every luxurious
taste, with erratic dissipations, and with a mental ferment of
scientific and literary and philosophic speculation.
Strangely there reverted to Tom’s mind from out of all his desultory
but avid reading the picture of Apollonius of Tyana arriving in Rome
in the cruel days of Nero. The book of Mr. Tredwell’s he had picked
up among a nondescript collection of odds and ends at a country-side
library to which gathered the tailings of private scholarship,
the chance offerings of missionary enterprises, an occasional
presentation copy from an enterprising publisher, and the discarded
extras of a newspaper office. Tom in a restless and skipping
manner had scoured these books for diversion, for instruction and
as youth will, for intimations, palatable but unhealthy, of the
currents of life in the channels where life moves most boisterously
and least restrained. Apollonius of Tyana quite caught his fancy.
That wandering figure, well furnished with the goods of the world,
appropriately screened from danger by a half supernatural grace,
wearing the garb of a preacher, and well drilled in local customs,
gentle with the bravado of spiritual superiority, and not averse
to finding out what the world contained, suited his own dreams of
action, though the companionable guardians of Tom’s fate in their
seclusion among the stars, might have smiled and shed tears over
the hazardous attempt to put Tom Ratler and Apollonius of Tyana in
the same category. Tom was not Apollonius, nor was New York in the
year 2000, the Rome of the year 50, though filled to the brim with
seditious, dissolute, serious and aggressively progressive elements.
Tom however—in his own thought—was seeing the world, or about to see
it. As he gazed upward that on-coming evening at the dark bulwarks of
the shrouded city, intermittently bathed on their summits and then
down their cliff-like sides by the aerial and diaphanous glows in the
skies, Tom felt the thrill of the unknown advancing towards him, and
all his eager senses reached out to receive its message and its gifts.
Nor was Tom a Nigel Olifaunt, the young Lord of Glenvarloch whose
adventures in London town at the beginning of the seventeenth
century Scott so humorously sets before his readers. He had come
upon no errand of restitution; and while his handy hand and emulous
spirits might engage him in some unlucky business, and his spirited
resentment bring him within the limits of a metropolitan Alsatia
he was not likely to become the victim of so unscrupulous a knave
as Lord Delgarno, nor run any risk of being tried for treason to
the state. If any comparison will help the reader to put Tom Ratler
in his proper phase of action let him recall Kenelm Chillingly’s
justification of his abrupt departure from his father’s home; “I go
in quest of adventure like Amadis of Gaul, like Don Quixote, like Gil
Blas, like Roderick Random; like, in short, the only people seeking
real life, the people who never existed except in books. I go on
foot; I go alone. I have provided myself with a larger amount of
money than I ought to spend, because every man must buy experience,
and the first fees are heavy.” Tom certainly bore little resemblance
to that accomplished cynic, and would have heartily derided—if he
understood them—most of his paradoxical conclusions, but like Kenelm
he had left home to see the world, and see it, where at the beginning
of the twentieth century it presented the most contrasted garniture
of forms and sentiments.
Tom noticed that while many persons were walking along the sea wall
of the Battery Park, and the settees were occupied by many couples
deeply interested in their mutual felicities, and a few families were
engaged in animated discussion of their household affairs, prospects,
and designs, the larger numbers were gathered around a central point,
whence the strains of very enlivening music proceeded. By reason of
its elevation, the band—evidently of large proportions—succeeded in
conveying these strains to the outskirts of its acoustic domain,
where Tom found himself. This concentration permitted him to walk
unimpeded around the wall, against the beautiful and shining bay,
looking towards monstrous beacons of light on the hills of Staten
Island, the shimmering walls of the Narrows and the nimbus of rays
that played over the populous shores of Bay Ridge, no longer retained
as a semi rural contour on the edge of the Harbor.
Scarcely conscious of any definite intentions, where all around him
invited him to continue a delighted and aimless ramble, Tom reached
the walls of the Aquarium, now occupying the old foundation of
Castle Garden, and, at the distant period to which we transport the
reader, yet retained, but immensely heightened and most inordinately
ornamented.
Tom could not clearly see the chase of zoological detail over the
glistening terra-cotta sides, though salient representations of
whales and porpoises, dolphins, tunas, tarpons, sword fish, and
sharks were descried by our traveller, whose astonished eyes however
were not always well enough informed to report their correct
identity. His eyes, bright and eager as they were, quite failed
to discern the wealth of marine naturalism, in sea urchins, coral
groups, medusas, hydroids, sea-cucumbers, molluscs, which encumbered
the ornamentation, mingled with the larger motifs, and luxuriantly
clustered at every interval between the swelling and pompous
immensity of the cetaceans, and the giant fish.
It was at this spot that Tom had reason to recall with gratitude the
agricultural training of his muscles, and to be roughly reminded that
the splendid city to which he had come was not unqualified in its
apparent possession of peace and order. In going round the circular
outskirt of this immense pavilion Tom reached its northern walls
approaching the confines of a great basin for the accommodation
of motor boats and naphtha launches, small pleasure yachts, and a
miscellaneous assortment of less definite water vehicles. Here the
shadow of the building was less successfully dispelled by the park
lamps, and as Tom turned to leave the angle, prompted to do so by
the deficiency of light, three figures seemed to spring from the
pavements, and with a consecutive movement too rapid to be easily
discerned, to fly at his back and front aiming fist blows at his head
and neck, and vicious kicks at his shins.
The most listless admirer of self defense, or the least intrepid of
its critics, would have rejoiced to have witnessed the lightning-like
metamorphosis in our whilome inert wanderer. His valise dropped from
his hand, and the motionless arms—so long and powerfully braced
with muscle, multiplied themselves with incredible rapidity in a
Briarean thicket of appendages before whose centrifugal violence his
assailants quickly vanished. The scuffle attracted some notice not
divorced from a desire, on the part of many, to see the stranger
worsted, and this sentiment was reinforced by the sudden approach
of a policeman entrusted with the wardenship of this quarter. A
sullen group of men and boys, vaguely referable to the Syrian section
of Washington Street, followed Tom, and their inquisition of his
appearance grew less and leas favorable, while a few epithets,
accompanied by a chance and unsavory missile in the shape of rotten
fruit acquainted him with his unpopularity.
Tom experienced a faint sense of disappointment, but his own warlike
instincts, readily aroused, permitted no movement of retreat, and
his disdain of his cowardly critics finally prompted him to turn and
walk with threatening alacrity towards them. This movement served
to disperse them, and as Tom remarked their skulking shapes, he was
joined by a much older man who had watched with interest and sympathy
the shifting relations of Tom and his tormentors. The stranger spoke,
and his measured and pleasant tones fell refreshingly on Tom’s ears,
to whom, overwhelmed by the immensity of his new surroundings, the
incident had seemed painful and unlucky.
“I see you are quite able to take care of yourself. I was ready to
take a hand myself against this bunch of loafers. I guess that you
are a new-comer, but don’t misjudge us from this little adventure.
The city is fairly orderly, as much so as most large towns, and you
can safely ramble over it at any hour of the day or night, without
much danger of molestation, though”—here the speaker drew a cigar
case from his pocket and handed its open end to Tom who with a slight
hesitation engendered by unfamiliarity with smoking, took one of the
proffered Wizards, as his new friend continued;—“though in some ways
we are dangerously near a domestic conflict much more serious than
street brawls or the incivility of hoodlums and nocturnal poachers.
Come over to the sea wall and sit down. I don’t wish to presume upon
the acquaintance my admiration of your strength has given me, but as
an older man and one not indifferently acquainted with the conditions
and the opportunities of this city, you may welcome some friendly
directions and advice.”
“Indeed, sir” answered Tom now thoroughly interested, if not quite
assured as to the honorable intention of his interlocutor, “I should
feel grateful for that. I am not a baby, and I believe that I can
pull through easily enough, but a few pointers at the outset may save
one from dangerous or expensive blunders. What is learned without
cost can be used without loss, is an old saying with us in Maine.”
As the two men moved towards the edge of the reservation it was
easily seen that Tom surpassed his companion in height, and if
this were not a sufficient assurance, any incipient suspicion of
danger would have been dispelled by the striking visage of Tom’s
acquaintance. He was a man of middle life hardly showing any of the
usual symptoms of increasing years. His hair, the weakest defence
against time’s encroachments, was yet untouched with gray, his face
was unmarred by a single wrinkle, his eyes of a peculiar brilliancy,
betokened intelligence and frankness, and the broad mouth, firm and
rather narrow lips, the chin perhaps a little too massive, confirmed
the unmistakable impression that our young adventurer had fallen
in with an unusual man—a man of observation and experience and
convictions.
Tom had himself quickly noticed these details and his confidence
increased, and even a sudden impulse of affection sprang up in his
heart as the momentary sense of his extreme isolation deepened into a
half reminiscent sadness. They had come up to one of the many seats
facing the bay, and the older man motioning to a bench, cut up into
separate seats by iron straps, sat down, while the end of his cigar
shone vividly as he puffed away, apparently abstracted, and making no
further overtures at conversation. Tom himself had become thoughtful
and silent, though he fully expected that the dialogue would be
resumed without his encouragement, and his mind dreamingly fell into
that mixed revery and consciousness, which overcomes us at such
restful moments. The waters before them, dark and viscid in their
unctuous flow, with scolloped concavities glazed with the moonlight,
lapped softly against the stones of the wall, and the band of music,
recoiling from some tempestuous climax, was breathing over them an
enticing melody.
It was Tom who first broke the silence between them.
“I suppose I can expect good employment in New York, sir,” he said,
yet unwilling to expressly declare his purpose. There was no answer;
and Tom looked more inquisitively at his neighbor, fearing that his
favorable deductions might have been premature. Again he spoke; “I
had a fancy that in this city of rich people I might get a good job
as motorist; I understand machinery, have used a steamer myself at
home, (as indeed he had), and reading of fair pay given capable men
in New York came on for employment.”
His companion woke up, or at least alighted from his soaring
meditations, turned a little towards Tom, and without the slightest
reference to Tom’s inquiry and declaration, began a deliberate sketch
of the social conditions of New York, its political dilemmas, and
its industrial power, almost as if, in response to some unheard
interrogation, he took advantage of the occasion to deliver himself
of a carefully prepared disquisition, though he conferred upon Tom
the honor of being the subject of that inaudible question.
“Yes, my friend,” he began, “New York has become the microcosm of the
whole world. Here are gathered together the nuclei of every school
of thought, every phase of social state is here; the abject poor,
the fabulously rich, and the industriously competent. Our population
is over sixteen millions. We are spreading to the furthest limits of
our territorial domain. Every art is practised here, and here each
art secures its highest rewards. Architecture has here risen to its
most stupendous and impossible tasks. Music finds here its greatest
audiences, and its exhibitions take place in the grandest temples.
Painting has here displaced the former superiority of France;
factories making every article that human ingenuity or human appetite
can invent for its satisfaction or its profit, are here in operation.
“We have become the cynosure of the world, and one million of
visitors a year has reversed the tide of curiosity from the old
world to the new; because our enormous wealth permits us to build
marvels and realize dreams. We have become a state, and this city
now possesses its own legislature, and frames laws for its own
government. Enormous universities furnish us with learning, and
under the impetus of an outrageous intellectualism large classes of
our population discard old habits of life, old creeds, old morals,
struggling with an impossible ardor to compass the meaning of life
in the surfeit of enjoyment and the rhapsodies of speculation.
The Catholic Church almost alone upholds the dogmas of the past;
Protestantism has deteriorated in Agnosticism, and Agnosticism
falls a prey to a devouring melancholy, which councils a happy
death, whenever life forgets its pleasures, or Age robs the senses
of their uses. Euthanasia, although a forbidden crime as the enemy
of the state, is secretly practised and from day to day sumptuous
Suicidariums are discovered and destroyed by the police.
“Science makes contributions, to our convenience, but is still dumb
on the questions of our purpose and origin. The transmutation of
metals is said to be almost discovered, and when gold can be made
from lead the tocsin of industrial activity will be sounded, and the
social machine, no longer able to maintain financial differences,
will run down, and, clotted with a metallic lubricant—no longer
serving its just ends,—will stop working, and our social state
resolve itself into a primordial protoplasm, whence the savage tribe
with chief and slaves, will slowly emerge, and the earth begin over
again its tiresome political evolution.
“But just now in this city the questions of policy grow daily more
complicated and dangerous. We have a gloriously rich class enjoying
the highest culture and withal benevolent, but living in undreamed
of splendor, and we have an educated class of operatives and middle
men with a proletariat of the very poor, who, often by their own
misdirection or proclivities, live stunted and desperate lives. These
classes form a vast body proclaiming a radical socialism and their
organization grows stronger and stronger with increasing population,
for family life, except within stringent limits, is discouraged by
the rich, and is despised by the _emancipated_.
“The balance of power will soon fall to the socialist, who lives
for breeding, and breeds by living. You have just come to our city
(and here the speaker for the first time turned directly to Tom, and
involved him directly in his allocution), at the close of a general
election for Mayor—the Mayor being the governor of our city-state.
It was a hot rancorous contest, and the successful candidate was
a compromise, a fusion brought about by the rich classes, the
moderately well off, and the Catholic labor vote. The new Mayor’s
position is a perilous one. He has hardly a bare majority in the
city Legislature. He himself is a dreamer, and over balanced with
metaphysical guesses, well trained in psychology, not inexperienced
in business, but at best a compromise, chosen to be the tool of
the rich, yet constitutionally a believer in some creed about the
Brotherhood of Man, and so without absolute direction, and without
force; and so also a farce, and a failure. Well—” (here the singular
monologue ended, and the speaker, who more and more astounded his
absorbed listener, stood up) “Yes—there are good chances for a
chauffeur of the right stamp in this city, where over ten per cent.
of the accidental deaths occur through motor accidents. Have you any
money?”
Tom no longer doubtful as to the integrity of his friend—his
rhetorical tirade convinced him that he was some one with
reservations of conscience—answered, as he also rose to his feet:
“I have three hundred dollars. Enough?”
The stranger had resumed his musings, looking away in the direction
of the Liberty Light whose flaring chords of flame now rose straight
into the sky like a contorted and tapering pinnacle of fire;—but he
heard; and turning again to Tom he said; “Very good. Go to the Hotel
Kohinoor near the Times Square. Get well lodged; Look well; Dress
well, and put an advertisement in the New York Times for a position
as a chauffeur. Give the hotel address. You will have answers to
choose from; mark me! Take my card! I will see you at any time.”
He handed Tom a card, and walked away after cordially shaking his
hand, though as he did it, he looked less at Tom, than at the
dispersing crowds who, no longer kept together by the band, were
dissolving in streams through the Battery grounds.
Tom moved to a lamp and read:
BENTON BRIGGS
(Secretary to the Mayor)
CITY HALL
Tom of course was duly impressed, and thanked his stars that the
assault on him had been made. He placed the card carefully in his
pocket book, and proceeded forthwith to find out the location of the
Hotel Kohinoor. He found the policeman who had aided in interrupting
the machinations of his enemies, and from him was directed to the
hotel which his informant assured him; “was the all-firedest most
expensive house in town.” Tom perhaps quailed a moment, but he
partially divined the philosophy of Mr. Briggs’ advice; he wanted a
rich employer, his own qualifications were, he knew, unimpeachable,
a little spurious distinction given to him by his handsome quarters
would not form a prejudice against him; on the other hand it was
intended by his adviser to form a direct appeal to the fastidious
personal tastes of the rich employer he was after. He intended to be
careful about his advertisement, and he had quite enough reliance
upon himself and his good looks to improve a favorable impression.
Ruminating over these things Tom found his way to the Subway which in
the year 2000 maintained its supremacy as an artery of travel, and
was flashed through its blazing conduit, to Forty-Second Street,
where he alighted. The hotel Kohinoor occupied the present combined
sites of the Metropole and the Saranac and represented the most
munificent expenditure of skill and fancy known to the publican world.
It was the marvel of two continents. The most daring mechanical
device had been united with the strangest and most defiant artistic
conceptions, and a result roundly denounced by the better taste of
the day, was also blazoned and paraded as the consummate expression
of the New School, a hackneyed phrase devoted at all periods of art,
to give distinction to oddity, if not to the vulgarity of empty
display.
It was a monstrous pagoda of stone and stucco, ornamented with
extraordinary grotesques of great size, and involved a curious use
of colored decoration with surprisingly copious development of
electrical illumination. At night the tapering structure, prolonged
upward to almost two hundred feet became a shimmering and splendid
spire of light by reason of chains of lamps swung from tip to tip of
its projecting antennae, each chain from top to bottom being swung,
as it were, by a mounting line of grinning goblins and laughing
nymphs, rendered in terra-cotta and affixed to the ends of the
antennae, which, on each story numbered twelve, making a sort of
angulation of the whole building, and these polygonal faces were
constructed to form as many façades, and a different treatment was
allotted to each in ornamentation and color.
This facetted and rather brilliant composition had suggested the
name Kohinoor and, as a term descriptive of scintillation and
gem-like glory, it applied well enough to the chromatic and photal
encrustation of this singular architecture, whose effrontery of
design drew to its doors and rooms the richest and the most eccentric
patrons.
The interior arrangement was not less striking nor less effective,
limiting that term to the range of ideas expressed in surprise and
disordered novelty. It consisted, in outline, of a central air
space, or well, reaching to the apical skylight—itself a fantastic
medley of colored glasses—conical in form. From the contracting areas
of the successive floors, encircled at each floor or story by a
gallery, whose edge upon the conical well was protected by a _rococo_
railing of brass, hung aprons of English ivy. The ascending floors
were designed as radial spaces with diverging corridors producing
rhomboidal rooms, and the corridors opened at their outside limit
upon a broad balcony, cut up into stalls, for the occupants of the
rooms.
The ground floor, entered from the street by ascending steps, was a
labyrinth of columns, arranged in stars, and holding between them
groined ceilings luxuriously painted with multitudes of enlacing
figures, borrowed from all the stages of life, the personages
of history, contemporaneous character, the idols of the theatre
the legends of poetry, figures of mythology; an intemperate
extravaganza of portraiture, in whose chaotic investiture and train
the impudence of the artist had placed politicians in compromising
union with goddesses, and mingled the decorum of the pulpit with the
bacchanalian antics of the chorus hall. Momentarily it was denounced
as a scandal and later it was welcomed as a joke, and at all times it
crowded the place with sightseers and gathered to it a spendthrift
retinue.
Lounging chairs and sofas of a deep cherry red, imitating coral stems
and growths, upholstered in a sea green tapestry, filled the space at
convenient intervals, and every hour was signalled by soft utterances
of music from a mammoth orchestrion. It was all in bad taste
relieved by extreme skill, but from top to bottom of the building,
and throughout its details the loosened revelry of libidinous fancy
was given full play. For want of a method it chased over the known
world for the exotic, the bizarre, the beautiful, and brought them
together in all phases of contact, producing a colossal maze of
features that could only, with trained artists, react in a monstrous
and terrifying weariness. It was principally a marvel of decorative
ingenuity, picking from the resources of industry every thing rare
and costly. What might have been styled a system of house gardening
prevailed within, and patches of flowers were installed in ample
vases and bowls, themselves richly conceived and executed, kept alive
by artifice, and stimulated by electric shades.
Into this unusual hostelry Tom Ratler came with no inconsiderable
trepidation, provoked, and naturally enough, by some apprehensions as
to the sufficiency of his pocket book to meet financial requirements
which might conform to so marvellous a place.
He found that however, in spite of its splendor, it could afford him
in its skyward limits a small room at, if not exactly a small price,
no ruinous toll. So he was whisked upward in the elevator tube that,
as a steel tube in open work, represented a towering and stupendous
palm, extended through the central air-space, with bridges at each
floor for the escape of its travellers.
The room was tiny but deliciously neat and, to Tom’s eyes,
ravishingly beautiful. It was in enamelled white, with a wall
paper that began at the bottom with a flush of white blossoms
on a dainty pink ground, and ended at the top in pendent boughs
bearing yellow—golden yellow—oranges. The furniture was made from
a delicately stained green wood, designed in patterns of rustic
simplicity; the windows were shaded by crisp chintz-like curtains,
whose figures represented various idylls of the country, from
chestnutting to May-day frolics. A soft downy red mat or rug covered
the floor, and water colors of charming freshness, delineating the
undressed pleasure of the seashore, decorated the walls. A little
bath room opened off this fascinating boudoir, and Tom standing
in the centre of the bewildering beauty and comfort, dropped his
hand valise, whistled softly, and for an instant thought of his own
plain bed-room at home, in which, were the reader able to follow
our friend’s dream, a well stored book-case, rude but serviceable,
occupying an entire wall, brimmingly filled with books of all sizes
and on all subjects, would have been revealed.
Tom at once attacked the task of preparing his advertisement. The
writing escritoire was supplied with pen, paper, and ink, and a few
moments only were necessary for the rough outlining of his “ad” which
changed a few times finally took this form;
WANTED—A position as a chauffeur by an experienced driver of
automobile cars. References furnished. Address Tom Ratler, Hotel
Kohinoor.
Tom again descended the elevator shaft; was directed to the
Times newspaper office opposite to the hotel itself, entered his
application, and, unwilling to yet trust himself to the throbbing
and blazing streets, retired to his exquisite aerie to think of his
new surroundings, and to gaze over that carpet of light punctuated
with brilliant orbs or crossed by sombre shafts of stone, that like
an undulous and phosphorescent scarf floated over and through the
Capital of the World.
And to Tom’s musing eyes there seemed to be at times speeding meteors
in trained or panoramic succession passing in the sky. And there was.
For to all other marvels of the growing years Science had added the
partial conquest of the air.
CHAPTER II
HELEN LORIMER
On that long and high ridge known to-day as Inwood that extends
from about 155th Street and Lafayette Boulevard to the northern
edge of Manhattan Island where the rocks with moulded and spherical
outline dip into the peaceful currents of the Spuyten Duyvil Creek,
in the year 2000, wealth and art had created an encrustation of the
most wonderfully beautiful architecture, harmonious in expression
and imposingly ornate. It was called—the region—Carrara, a term
signalizing the almost unbroken use of marble or limestone in the
construction of the palaces that dominated this rocky and precipitous
comb of vertical schists, tumbling picturesquely into the waters of
the Hudson.
Looked at from the eastward elevations at Fort George, itself at the
beginning of the twentieth century a public park, extricated from
the present serpentine horrors of scenic railways this Inwood slope
presented a splendid façade. It borrowed features wrought in dreams
and pictures, it contained delicate and noble effects incorporated
in stone, blended together with unerring mastery, and linked with
each other throughout its entire length, as if in a tracery of
architectural wonders. Imagination, controlled by scholarship, played
here its part with subtlety and composure. It dealt with creations,
and it dealt with them as the Creator has dealt with the world,
through the imposition of Law. A little of that bizarrerie and
witchcraft, rampart elsewhere in the stupendous City, had faintly,
yet noticeably touched the august and serene construction, but had
touched it as the coruscations of golden edges touch the towering
clouds at sunset.
It became almost roseate under the spell of some transfiguring
sunsets, dark and effective beneath scowling skies, and again
shone like alabaster in the zenith sweeping sun. Conceive a long
heaped hill of chateaux, built entirely of marble, except at a
few telling points relieved with colored stones, their principal
pediments crowning the summit of the hill, and their approaches—that
on the Kingsbridge road—an ascending terrace of steps, with broad
platforms hedged with green thickets, plentifully sprinkled with
wide and capacious vases, opulent in flowers and trailing vines—the
trumpet creepers sometimes lit up the snowy walls with orange
carmine coronas—here and there a noble tree, usually a pine or
fir, fitted with artistic precision, cut out, cameo-like, against
balustraded loggias. Conceive the crest of this hill, a sky-line of
towers, minarets, angulated gables, flat roofs—on which again by a
somewhat indecorous fancy flowers were strewn—and clotted ambuscades
of spires. Pass beyond the eastern exposures to the westward,
and imagine a contrasted aspect over the steep escarpment of the
Lafayette Boulevard; see how, limited by the precipitous declivities
there, the multiform expansions on the east have changed generally
into flat walls, graced indeed by niches and balconies, overhanging
extensions, but rising with perpendicular austerity to considerable
heights. It was as though a growing and lovely crystal had flattened
against an impregnable partition, and, revealing its color, concealed
its form. The topography of the region compelled this curtailment,
since the villas could not well be built over the ragged and vertical
edges of the cliffs, though by an extreme audacity, at points, with
great expense, the ornate or diversified architecture had been pushed
out over the beetling rocks, by means of iron piers estopped in the
gneiss beds, whereon, upon a platform of iron also, the structures
had enlarged symmetrically to their formal type.
This partial abbreviation was not necessary in all cases, as where
the platform at the summit of the ridge was wide enough to allow
the development of the building. The hill side on the east, thus
constructed in related and harmonious architectural contours,
summoned an enthusiastic admiration. It represented the aristocratic
isolation of extreme wealth, in a class born to indulgences, fostered
by education, and not devoid of intellectual distinction.
And Carrara represented a wholesome unity of purpose; in an artistic
sense its design was consolidated into an expression of the
renaissance, and except at a few spots, where the prevalent taste for
irregularities and the conceited thirst for strangeness—a strangeness
based on kaleidoscopic conglomerations—had impertinently entered its
purer and poetic thought, like a hectic weed among chaste flowers,
the aggregation was a lovely structural symposium.
Northward, where now the protecting spire of the House of Mercy
pierces the ambuscade of trees, towers small and round, large and
square, many affixed in corbelled tiers to angled mansions, and some,
campanile-like, aspiring upward with tenuous and diminishing lines,
filled the sky. Further south on the declining slopes that bend to
the Dyckman road an interfering group of flat topped Norman keeps,
their walls broached by wide embrasures, with brick chimneys on
their sides, picturesquely soaring above the interlaced and somewhat
compactly combined trees, brought the eyes of the reviewer to the
more stately Italian villas, that decorously encumbered the southern
section of this long Inwood elevation.
The harder rugged contours northward, with their architectural
austerity, here met an expanded and luxurious invention. Extreme
taste and the insinuation of transatlantic memories were apparent.
Park-like expanses along the Kings Bridge road, traversed by paths,
ascended to the marble stairways whose stately and interrupted ranges
led to the marvellous villa palaces irregularly delineated on the
crown of the ridge.
Among these was one which by some idiosyncrasy of ornament,
some bewitching adjustment of parts, and predominantly by a rare
invocation of the graces of plant decoration drew the attention
most quickly, and held it by a richness of detail, controlled by
refinement and discrimination. It was throughout coherent in style,
with such exterior embellishment as to attract notice, without going
so far as to disfigure its technical virtue. Its architect would
have suited Mrs. Rennselaer’s requirements of being “content with
conforming his structure to its function, and modelling the masses
thus arrived at, so as to heighten their inherent expression.” Yet he
had taken his renaissance quite sincerely, and absorbed with devotion
the mainsprings of artistic design it furnished. The mansion was
Italian, and by reason of its scholastic fidelity freed itself from
the aberration of the treatments which had become rampant in the City
elsewhere, and which, to revert to the same authoress’s denunciation
of an earlier forerunner of this boisterous school assumed “rather
the character of an explosion, than of an evolution.”
The villa was not however a stone fortress, such as guarded the
treasures of the Florentine nobles, nor precisely those less simple
constructions of Rome. Deprived of the foil and the accompaniment
of the water, it yet simulated the style of the Venetian palace,
and rose, a tetragonal block of incised and decorated masonry, its
stories separated by ribbons of ornamentation in balustrades, their
windows arched and spandrelled, their pilasters grouped and salient,
with the corniced roof dropping in pendant spindles of cut stones,
while still higher rose a low parapet pierced by circular apertures.
Sculpture and chiselled delicacy of the brocaded stone surrounded
some of the basement windows. These latter continued to the floor,
became doors, and these opened upon the highest terrace, itself
fenced with columns separated from each other by a low intricately
cut wall, while each carried on the flat top of its capital an
electric lamp within an opalescent shade.
The obvious incongruity of this pile on the table top of the ridge
was successfully masked by the addition of a grove of trees on either
side, and by the spreading terraces, that with a medial convexity and
deployed edges, melted into lateral coppices of bushes. The terrace
formed by this peristyle was the entrance courtyard of the mansion,
and the distant observer gazed upon the facade of the house, through
a wide interval between the columns themselves, which could be closed
when desired, by two richly designed iron gates.
This composition possessed the rational elements of beauty. An
intellectual grasp gathered its not over-charged detail into a unit
of purposeful expression. We are to enter that beautiful home and
within it again the evidences of culture, and the outlays of fortune,
would fascinate us, but they will pay tribute, in our minds, to that
woman, who, like Hypatia in Alexandria sways the heart no less by
her loveliness, than by the strength and depth of her nature, Helen
Lorimer. This challenging spirit, clad in feminine allurements,
had been called in the socialist paper of the day—The Beehive—“the
demoniacal Syren of Injustice.” This abode of cunningly devised
beauty is hers.
The few words dropped by the Secretary of the Mayor to Tom Rattler
in his fortuitous encounter with that young man, and which may have
sounded enigmatical, and certainly ominous to the reader, may now,
at this stage of our history, be usefully enlarged upon, as it will
bring this unusual woman into intelligible relations with the coming
events to be here described.
Movements throughout the twentieth century had reflected that
changing molecularity in the social stage, which presaged new and
perhaps perilous rearrangements of its political constitution. Their
potency was more conspicuous in America, than in Europe, for in
America the mobility of the social fluid was more established, and
the solvent of opinion worked more rapidly and with less opposition;
the organs of publication and propagandism plied their trade utterly
unfettered, and not without admirable aplomb and sincerity. Similar
movements of course had made themselves felt even more obviously
in Europe, and had provoked repression, that was violent, but
successful, for in Europe so deeply rooted and inexpugnable are the
tradition and the fact of class, that power had only to appeal to the
military support to still maintain ancient forms. In fact it had long
been felt that the armies of Europe were less necessary to maintain
existing states than to curb and extirpate the brooding forces of
insurrection and discontent, less necessary to defend frontiers than
to establish garrisons as a network of protection against internal
foes. Throughout large portions of Europe a certain sloth of mind,
the inertia of custom, the niggardliness of choice, and a certain
artistry in the common people with an undeveloped culture, attached
them to the livery of caste, and created a residue of resistance to
radical change.
Still in Europe there had been trouble, and the arguments of
socialists and other more unrestrained and dangerous, illicit and
quarrelling cults, had kept the social cauldron boiling, and the
ci-devant crust, formed over hitherto quiescent and hidden contents,
in many places was broken into fragments, rotating and pitching
in a turbulent commotion. But that, at the exact moment of this
story, had subsided. In America prosperity and education, which had
reached deeply down to the lower areas of society, had resulted
in contrasted conditions, but in a no less active and indeed more
energized demand for some sort of renovated and metamorphosed state.
And for this reason. The Trust system had enveloped everything;
and quite acceptably to the majority of the people. Established in
the nineteenth century, its first status had considerably changed,
since, by reason of the regulative legislation inaugurated by
Theodore Roosevelt, it had instituted enormous popularizing movements
throughout the nation, whereby its stocks of all sorts became
distributed, so that separated and numerically large communities
were its beneficiaries. The dangers predicted one hundred years
before, of its subversive power over justice, and its high handed and
conscienceless demolition of competition, seemed to have disappeared,
as in the first place the trusts were forcibly regulated from
Washington, and in the second their power over trade had practically
exterminated the individual merchant, or left him a tributary to the
Trust’s needs.
Their avenues of emolument were unimpeded and they were numerous.
But however much they had absorbed the savings of the laborers and
middle men of all sorts, of course, immense fortunes, rolling up into
colossal sums, had accumulated in the hands of a rather vast group of
rich men and women, and the tireless development of all the utilities
of the state, and the resources of the soil, with an enormous average
prosperity, had augmented swollen thrift, and created fortunes which
were the marvel and the gossip of two continents.
By the mere fact of their almost superhuman possibilities of
indulgences, these rich classes, at several points in the nation’s
domain had gathered into brilliant and luxurious colonies, and in
New York they had concentrated into a nucleus of really dazzling
splendor. Now contrasts work the ruin of states, if interested
agitators and the exorbitant envy of malicious men, or even the
plausible volubility of self-deceived reformers attack them.
Physical conditions in New York were not bad at the beginning of the
twenty-first century. Science and a most munificent and extravagant
government had given to the populace almost everything they might
reasonably expect, but there were poor and poverty, a great deal of
it, indeed, and amongst the dreams of the socialistic philosopher was
the abolition of both.
New York city had become a state with its governor (the mayor) and a
legislature, and it had incorporated the elements of socialism quite
momentously, in so far as the street cars and all public utilities
were controlled and operated by the city government, the ferries,
telephone, telegraph systems within the city’s limits, and it was, at
the era we are now studying, contemplating exercising some sort of
discretionary power over the disposition of wealth beyond a certain
amount in the interest of public improvements, public hospitals,
and public entertainments. It had advanced the ideas of public and
free education beyond all previous conceptions of convenience or
propriety, by maintaining a free theatre, and a free opera, whose
primary institution had in view the presentation of classic art in
the drama and in music, but which, under a lax administration and the
encroaching influences of a deleterious gayety, had declined somewhat
from these ideals.
For it must be remembered that socialism had at this time assumed the
features of a most frank and to our mind, most repellent naturalism.
Without suffering from need and lacking the incentives of acute
deprivation, the poorer classes had attached themselves to leaders,
some of whom as to-day were rich men whose political ideas involved
the utopia of universal competence, individual equality, radically
extended to every function and faculty of man, and they mingled
with this irrational aim a cloud of violent vagaries, in which
age disappeared, sickness, the family, traditional religion; and
humanity, by the preposterous hocus-pocus of their blandishments of
words, became something different, ineluctable, and divine.
As a matter of fact, in spite of all this vaporing the visitor to New
York in the year 2000, from this present year of grace, would have
found a prevalent social resemblance to the civism of to-day. The
theory of the suffrage remained the same, also its use, courts of law
tried cases, the police repressed crime, the streams of people in
the streets presented sharp and informing contrasts, papers reported
the news and, with art and circumspection, discussed their meanings,
occasional correspondents ventilated their nostrums or their wit,
the book stores and the publishers still fed the eye and mind with
elegant books and sumptuous illustrations; in Wall Street the same
fevered haste and nervous throw of guesses; elsewhere the marts
of trade plied unremittingly their business of getting money, and
dissipation and amusement claimed their votaries, and claimed them
with a freshened splendor of apparatus and intoxicants.
He would indeed see churches, cathedrals, though his distinguishing
observation would have noted the vast predominance of the catholic
houses of worship. One astonishment might be expected for him; it
was the larger size of the men and the robust beauty of the women,
together with the appearance of a type of face especially pleasing,
in which an artistic or poetic fire dwelt, a suggestion that would
have been provoked in his mind by a certain depth of coloring, by a
suavity of demeanor, a graciousness of address with a predisposition
to expressive smiles, a luxuriance of hair, and essentially by dark
and luminous eyes.
This type had been projected, through intermarriage and
domiciliation, from the Italians, and somewhat, by a remarkable
refinement of face, produced in Hebrews who had married Italians.
The Italians had developed in America an extraordinary and consuming
patriotism, with an incessant and almost belligerent skill in making
themselves felt in its art, and its politics. They had eventuated
into an important fibre in the national issue, and markedly so in New
York. As a rule this type were smaller than the average in height and
size, and again this larger type belonged to the Germans, Americans,
_in stricto sensu_, and the English, and this macropodia, as the
faculty designated it, had resulted from health and exercise.
But our anticipatory visitor would have quickly noted the physical
magnificence of the great city, its inordinate ambitions in building,
in design, in contrasts, together with the evidence of a positive
mania to erect statues, itself a most illuminative proof that the age
had undergone some mental or emotional changes, since that period,
one hundred years before, when the claims of art in the streets had
either been neglected or awkwardly remembered by limping executions.
This change again had been effected by the Italians, in conjunction
with the strong American school of art. And among all the marvels of
the metropolis, Carrara, in its marble glory would have most acutely
raised his marvelling admiration.
This unique precinct, with its amazing glory of architecture blending
into an expression of consummate taste and boundless wealth, the
reader has already been asked to notice. A more difficult task for
the writer is encountered in imposing upon his imagination the
character and the temperament and mind of Helen Lorimer whose force
and fascination swayed so effectively the people who built and
inhabited this region of delight. Here again a retrospective study
is necessary, and the reader must inspect the phases of this woman’s
ancestry. Helen Lorimer had not been the originator, though she
was, at the moment, the most influential and eloquent exponent of a
remarkable movement which had elevated the rich into an intellectual
distinction, which had made of them a class by themselves, not from
the possession of wealth, but from an indisputable eminence of
aspiration and achievement. All the rich were not certainly in this
class, but the processes of selection and sympathy had separated into
a phenomenal isolation and a real prominence those, who, conjoined
by a religion of practical ideals, met the requirements of a very
exigent and noble standard, wherein also grew a lofty and not
altogether prepossessing pride.
As early as the end of the nineteenth century a few rich men had
begun a process of self-appraisement and conciliation. Rockefeller,
Carnegie, Stanford, Widener, Mills, Morgan, Jesup, and others had
signalized their oneness with the great majority, and their personal
sense of responsibility, by large gifts to the common weal, both
in benevolent and in educational foundations. They established a
certain nobility of conduct, as essential to wealth. Such an impulse,
elaborated and added to, in the prerogatives of superiority, had
developed, in the closing years of the twentieth era, notably by the
powers and talent of a group of the rich, who had achieved eminence.
_Noblesse oblige_ in them had assumed an expression of high motives,
painstaking industry, and deliberate culture. They established a most
curious system of self inspection. They insisted upon an aristocracy
of talent, and scholarship, and prowess as well. A social congress
among them settled the possible career of the younger members of
their class, whether in art or literature, or public service, and
this settlement was quite rigorously recognized and obeyed. They
aimed at a splendid publicity before the people and they won it. At
every point—such was their programme—they intended to make their
class felt as powerful and as illustrious.
And it was the doctrine and the policy of self protection. The more
astute had felt the dangerous—in their eyes—movements of the day and
they knew that a high bred and insertively practical and ornamental
prestige before the world, would protect and establish their union
with the state. The indication of talent among the young of their
class was noted with rapture, and the young possessors were pushed
along prescribed paths of prescribed duties; so that this wealthy
aristocracy were influential at all points in the civic circle, and
shone with an enviable brightness before the country. Relentlessly
pursuing this plan they even went outside of their class to ally to
themselves new blood to engraft upon their own stem the strength
of its promise and gifts, wherever it was discovered; and these
new recruits, chosen—but with circumspection—anywhere, were caught
up into the heavens of culture, and their talent augmented by
education and opportunity, while they themselves, body and soul, were
incorporated in the caste that became their sponsor and host. It
was a really singular phenomenon, the inward growth of a realizing
conviction that a rich society should knit its life with the nation’s
in a meritorious service, where, ever and anon, the fire of genius
lit a resplendent flame.
This movement, at the beginning of the twenty-first century, was
at its zenith, and among the most noble, and intellectual of its
exponents and actors, was the beautiful woman, Helen Lorimer. It
was said of her that she combined the brain of a Harriet Martineau,
the soul of a Florence Nightingale, and the bodily glory of the
Fornarina. In her conjunction of circumstances and the generosity of
nature had united to form a very perfect being. The blood of Italy
was in her veins bearing its passion, and the blood of the New World
bearing its sense. She was a dreamer but she lived in the field of
action. She painted her horizons with pictures, but she fashioned the
instruments of her designs with judgment, and made those pictures
part of the solid earth. Phraseology with her became a portent of
new plans, and the plans vividly recalled the language that depicted
them, without losing much of that fidelity, when they became facts.
Miss Helen Lorimer presented to the world the fusion of traits and
powers, which, like some admirably contrived fruit in nature, was
the result of lineage. Not that her descent involved any reference
to distinguished forebears, but that a union of characters had
developed in her which heredity had secured from a cross in stocks,
whereby, to use a Mendelian phrase, the dominant traits were all good
and remained, and the recessive were all bad and had disappeared.
Her grandparents had been Italians, who in a love match had come to
America, and had quickly won success, so that their children, one of
whom was the mother of Miss Lorimer, secured all the advantages of
education, with those of travel.
Her grandfather belonged to a good family of Florence and her
grandmother was a fashionable belle in the city of Genoa. Their
elopement provided romantic incidents, in so far as the parents on
either side, united in a frantic effort to separate or intercept the
runaways, as they had completely disarranged some prepared alliance,
commercially more valuable. The chase ended with the sea-side, and
Antonio Ferrara and Francesca Espozito enjoyed their married bliss
uninterrupted, and surrounded themselves, in their new home, with a
family of five children, the third of whom was a girl of physical
perfection, possessing musical talent and a voice of melting
contralto richness. This popular addition to her native charm, and
the excellent social and business position of her father made the
young Julieta a widely popular _debutante_, and, at some public Ball,
she had ensnared the affections of Robert Lorimer a scion of one of
the richest of the New York circle of millionaires and a devotee of
art, naturally not inattentive to the enchanting sweetness of the
young Italo-American girl.
Young Lorimer with the studied gracelessness of artistic and
emotional youth failed to inform his family of his desires and
designs, and, realizing at rather a late moment, the value of the
family recognition of his matrimonial choice, contrived to introduce
his fiancée to his family’s notice under the following promising
circumstances. He inaugurated a series of impromptu concerts which
were given at houses on the Carrara. In one of these Robert arranged
a picturesque situation depicting himself as a wandering artist,
ravished with the beauty of an Andalusian orange grove, and less
impersonally seduced by the maiden, who, lingering behind the other
gatherers, at the close of the day, turns on him her inexorable eyes
and just as a sentimental and well regulated moon sheds a mellow
radiance upon an abundance of Florida Grape fruit heaped up in a New
York market basket.
The lingering orange picker of course was the irresistible Julieta of
whom the wandering and transfixed artist asks a number of irrelevant
questions, and on expressing a surmise that she probably could sing
is answered by the sudden outpouring of a melodious Spanish love
song, in which Julieta, herself hopelessly entangled in the same
silken chords with the handsome Robert Lorimer, exerts her skill to
immoderately confess her own predicament. The trick was a complete
success, and the young woman rapidly won a technical position,
whence her introduction as the daughter-in-law of Algernon Lorimer,
the head of the Lorimer establishment, though somewhat disparaged
by the timidity and decorous hesitation of the mistress of the same
institution, was definitely accomplished.
Robert Lorimer inherited his father’s brain and much of his
mother’s consistent delicacy of feeling, and developed what was
quite undiscoverable in either, a deep artistic creativeness, less
signalized in broad conceptions than in subtlety of composition, and
the mysticism of shadows, half lights, and spectral shapes. Julieta
magnificently completed her conquest of music. Her vogue was immense,
and she and her husband engaged with enthusiasm in that regulation
and elevation of the rich classes which we have pointed out which
became a consecration and mission in their daughter Helen.
Helen was their only child, and as upon her would develop the trying
responsibilities of the Lorimer millions, and as also she revealed
precocious gifts of mind, with a startling beauty, Robert and Julieta
lavished upon her what might be called a bountiful care. In other
words, they took every imaginable means to enrich her mind, to mature
her nature, to refine her feelings, without losing sight of the
immense opportunism nature had granted them, because of her beauty,
to make her glad and buoyant. And the subject of all this care
responded with precision.
She grew daily in graciousness not unmixed with roguery; she engaged
her time with scrupulous regard to every demand, and fulfilled the
promises of her parents in music and art. Her taste became more
massive than her father’s and her music more German than was the
flavor of her mother’s luscious Italian melodies. She had advanced
upon her parent’s standpoints, and they admiringly noted the firmness
of her grasp in scholarship, the speculative earnestness of her
reflections, and the unexpected depth of her religious feeling.
In a sense and way they felt a curious awe of her, as if her
thoughtfulness betokened some dreadful reaction of weariness and
collapse, and they watched her at times with sincere anxiety, and
with whispered comments of mutual confession.
But Helen ripened with absolute normality. She loved friends, she
entered the customary diversions of society with a vigorous thirst
for all its reasonable pleasures, and she brought to her feet the
young men who found her delightful in discussing a regatta, or a
lawn tennis tournament, or in the tripping coquetry of winning
raillery, and who left her enthralled, without dreaming (except as
common talk gave her reputation) that she could narrate the history
of the popes, or give them a review of the early systems of American
philosophy, or even with less effort, set before them the triumphs
of modern music. In one aspect of human learning Helen Lorimer was
apathetic. She spurned science; not indeed with self-satisfaction
and disdain, but by a quiet repulsion of silence when its vaunted
triumphs were rehearsed, and its importance was mentioned. Something
in the hard and fast outlines which science gives its topics,
something especially in the sodden matter-of-fact dreariness of its
professors, and yet more relevantly, in her case, something repellent
in its unmistakable rejection of the unproven and the imaginative.
Its war with religion jarred her, and she withdrew from it as from a
monstrous and fatal thing which would wreck the beauty of the world
of poetry and art. At the age of twenty Robert and Julieta went with
her to Europe, to its capitals, its galleries, its historic centres,
completing an exhilarating survey with a prolonged visit to the city
of Rome. The impressions left by Rome upon Helen were critical. They
influenced her whole life, and made of her instantly the instrument
of accomplishing the most momentous religious change that the modern
world has seen. It was at Rome under the seraphic touch of inspired
painting, under the thrill and the mystical appeal of antiquity,
under the occult fascinations of symbolism in its ritual, that Helen
imbibed faith in the Catholic church, and threw herself at once into
its arms, without misgivings and with a trembling joy.
This was not wholly unexpected by Robert, who in many conversations
with his daughter had been struck with her reactionary tendencies in
thought, and her many museful inquiries into the power of the Roman
church, while in a natural way the habit of Julieta, brought up a
Catholic, reasserted itself with the ardor of resurrection in the
younger woman. The matter at first gave her parents some concern, but
in so cosmopolitan a temperament and so loving and soothing a nature
as her father’s, there could not be long a permanent objection, and
in the case of her mother there was just a secret satisfaction.
And so Helen Lorimer became a Catholic, and her profoundest
affections turned—at first lightly—to a strange project, one barely
to be mentioned aloud, one only to be dreamed over in the darkest
hours of the night, or brooded over in the uttermost seclusion of
revery and anticipation; _Helen Lorimer yearned to bring the Pope to
America_.
It was a mad thought perhaps, some Catholics might have deemed it
iniquitous, and most would have found in such a plan the dissolution
of the church from all its temporal and historic verities. But Helen
was not thinking of Rome and its associations, perhaps not clearly
concerned was she at first with the Catholic church itself.
She was intensely patriotic, she felt a divination of the vast
political tendencies of the age, and she saw around her in the
states a disintegrating Protestantism, or thought she saw it; with
too, a very militant Catholicism, she believed the restitution of
religion to the country she so ardently loved could only come through
a momentous application of sacramental grace, and that, she also
believed, would be brought by the Pope’s removal to America. She
had indeed become entirely familiar with the savage dissatisfaction
of a large portion of the Italian capital’s population with the
Pope, and she knew that the body of Leo XIII yet remained unburied
in its selected sepulchre at the St. John Lateran, the beautiful
basilica outside the immediate limits of the City, because of this
dissatisfaction. She indulged too, in other fancies, as that the
Pope, taken away from Rome, and placed in America, would mean a
renovation of the church itself, an infusion of the fresh blood of
her country, with its unselfish attachment to ideals, in the parched
and worn channels of circulation in the church, so that its altars
might more worthily carry the weight of that supreme sacrifice which
daily fed its votaries. The emotional tides of her being, stirring
now with restrained and yet compelling force, swept her on into
pageants of speculation, where her susceptibilities received the
stimulus of dazzling and painted pictures, pictures of the church’s
triumph.
When Robert and Julieta returned to America with their wonderful
daughter in whom they began to see the promises of a powerful and
creative personality, they encountered the secularistic movement
among the rich which we have partially hinted at. Nothing could
have better suited the lofty temperament of Helen Lorimer, with its
aristocratic isolation as also its sane industrial zeal to add to the
beauty and usefulness of things, than just this attempt to give a new
and special significance to wealth, building up a group, a class, a
caste, eminent by talent, by accomplishments, by public devotion, and
so enshrining their heritages of mere money within the protective
virtues of character and mentality.
Helen turned to this new thought with all the energy of her
temperament, and wrote, talked, missioned, gathered around her
coteries both of men and women, who received power at her hands to
accomplish the desirable result, and her home—fully surrendered to
her for her own best purposes by her parents—became the headquarters
of the secularists. Older heads than Helen’s, also saw the
usefulness of this. They knew the widening strides of, to them, an
unaccountable socialism; they heard its threats; and while nowhere
else in the world was there such remarkably distributed competence
and household happiness as in these United States of America, at
this one point of New York socialism raised an ominous head, showed
a spiteful tongue, and at the last election—that referred to by the
Mayor’s secretary with Tom Ratler—manifested a most unwelcome and
alarming numerical power.
It was well and necessary that socialism should be robbed of its
influence, cut loose from the moorings of discontent by the utility,
the generous attitude, the fine quality in its acts, the nobility
of its sentiments, the individual strength of its members, of the
rich. Helen had advanced all previous schedules of action in this
particular. She had given public lectures, had entered the enemy’s
country, had translated the lessons of history to her popular
audiences, and had immensely swayed her listeners by her eloquence,
and no less by her conquering beauty, a beauty which came to them
dressed in the habiliments of an opulent taste, for Helen Lorimer
instinctively rejected that shallow condescension which would
palliate differences by false pretences, and the masquerade of
imitation.
Her strength had indeed disconcerted the editorial corps of The
Beehive, whose younger members became as much reconciled to her views
by her face and form, as they might have been by her syllogisms had
they taken the time to carefully rehearse them. Helen reiterated
the philosophy of regime, and dwelt on the analogies of nature. She
contended frankly for the gradations of society, and urged it as a
biological law or as a principle of physics. She popularized Hobbs
and she disseminated Montesquieu. She christianized Hume and lent a
new flavor to the amenities of Talleyrand. She was a success, and The
Beehive had retorted by epithet and innuendo.
In time the windows of life darkened to Robert, her father, and he
died almost in her arms, a deeply loved parent. He had watched his
daughter with a gracious pride, and an almost pathetic obedience to
her slightest wish introduced him to her intimacies of thought, and
made him the confidant—more than her mother—of her unusual hopes. On
her father’s demise the Lorimer family consisted of Robert’s older
brother Theodore, her mother Julieta, and Helen herself. Theodore
was a childless widower, and although somewhat more severe and
practical in type—being a good business man—than his brother, fell
too under the fascination of the gifted woman, who now represented
the residuary heir to the immense wealth of Algernon Lorimer, her
grandfather, a Napoleon of finance with more enduring qualities than
this misused appellation usually connoted.
In many ways perhaps Helen Lorimer recalled the image one might
form of Margaret Fuller, but it could not be said of her, as Miss
Martineau had said of her distinguished contemporary, that she lived
and moved in an ideal world, “talking in private and discoursing
in public about the most fanciful and shallow conceits which the
transcendentalists of Boston took for philosophy.” Helen Lorimer
doubtless moved and lived in an ideal world for herself, but she was
practical, and this aspect of her nature gave her that humanness that
made her delightful to those immensely removed from her intellectual
eminence.
And she had the saving grace of humour, wholesome, natural,
indisputable fun. She denounced indeed the widespread flippancy of
the day which represented the levity of a world which had seriously
lost its faith, and restlessly sought a sensuous satisfaction,
drinking, to the death of all ennobling feeling, the ready made
potations cleverly concocted of mere pleasure; but she knew, none
better, that the world was wonderfully ingenious, wonderfully smart,
apt, and in the works of construction and convenience wonderfully
helpful. Only she felt that the world revelled in too much delight,
she felt that it would forget any outward and ulterior destiny
in its passionate absorption in its own triumphs, its incessant
excitements. Death and old age and infirmity had had sobering and
realizing shocks to apply to carelessness in former times, but at
the beginning of the twenty-first century, science had marvellously
dissipated even these, in conjunction, let it be admitted, with a
kind of psychic medicament whereby thought helped to banish worry and
ailments.
Miss Lorimer recognized that the world moved, but she would have
substituted other motives. She often said that the world must have a
motor power and it would always be either pleasure or religion, as
the thirst for knowledge actuated too small a numerical number to
become a virtual force in its economies or plans, and of these motors
she preferred religion. To the poor it had always been the great
consolation.
And rich as she was, Helen Lorimer felt that the arbitrament of
life’s worth rested at last with those who most sorely tasted its
disappointments and yet, with so developed a sympathy with suffering,
she clung tenaciously to the hierarchical conception of society’s
classification, reverting with a kind of mediaeval intensity to past
social states.
About this woman Romance spun its silken and iridescent webs.
Youth bowed to her smiles and lost its heart in her favoring
glances. Perhaps her cloud of chevaliers was made up of a tested
selection of admirers, or those confident and brave enough to
match their acquirements with one so loftily endowed, but if so,
it was not because of any pedantry in her. A delightful geniality
made her always companionable, always winning, and put at ease any
_soi-disant_ swain, who indeed might have been thereby captivated
with his own eligibility. The blood of Julieta Espozito was in her
veins, and nature disdained to release her from the impulses of all
her sons and daughters. If this academic review has aroused the
reader’s interest, let him now step into the presence of the woman
herself, see her charms, hear her voice, and begin with us the
history of a short episode of her life.
CHAPTER III
A DINNER IN CARRARA
The _entresol_ of the Lorimer mansion was occupied by the dining
hall, a room of magnificent proportions and superbly conceived in
decoration, the elegance of its detail being dominated by the size
and breadth of a few features.
One wall was breached by a wide entrance, from which descended a
series of steps to a lower hall; opposite this entrance the high wall
contained an admirable reproduction of the painting of Alma Tadema of
the Hunt of Diana, between two high windows, issuing upon balconies
overlooking the Hudson; either end of the room held two enormous
mirrors framed in Japanese bronze designed in flowers, fruits, and
trailing creatures of the field; under these astonishing mirrors were
two fire places equipped in monumental brass; on the sides of the
entrance the walls were partially concealed by two large Madonnas,
one by Perugino, the other by Tintoretto, and under these pictures
two sideboards in carved teak wood held a rich assortment of blue
India ware grouped around a few high silver vases, whose surfaces in
repoussé reviewed the spoils of the hunter; the corners of the room
received four large groups of statuary, which separately symbolized
the seasons; the ceiling was a massy plane of gold unrelieved by
any designs, and from it depended three chandeliers of cut glass in
blue aqua-marine like Brazilian stones; the walls were treated with
a pale veronica blue, the chairs were of twisted Honduras bay wood,
and yellow silken curtains masked the light that poured in at the
casements, whose outlook faced the Palisades, and caught the purple
banks of the New Jersey hills.
The floor of this apartment was in Pompeian mosaic, and at its centre
rose the singular dining table, which was literally nothing else
than a huge block of stucco of a pale terra-cotta ivory color, cut
out underneath into arches, with a frieze at the edges of the table
top representing oak leaves and acorns. This rigid and somewhat
unaccommodating erection had a very beautiful effect indeed, and
added an entablature to the room that made it more stately and
impressive. Heavy rugs invested the floor, and banished its stony
coldness, which effort on their part was successfully reinforced
by the flickering and homelike light of the candles in the quaint
majolica candelabra over the mantels at both ends of the room. This
at night, but otherwise and when not animated by the presence of its
natural human occupants the great chamber uttered a note shading into
an unpleasant solemnity, as of a public hall or a museum foyer.
It was that liquid season of the year as the spring retires from
the presence of summer, leaving at the latter’s feet the garlands
of her flowers, sweeping away the last fragrant curtains of April’s
showers, and inviting the auroras of the sun to rise higher in the
skies, while, as she fades away on the white blossoms of May, she
already touches the petals of a thousand waking roses, and summons
the tides of life, upon whose floods June approaches, to renew the
world. It was indeed a little before the opening of June 2000,
that, as the shades of night fell, or rather as its shadows grew
accentuated beneath the orbed splendor of the moon, a group of six
persons were seated around the dining table of the Lorimers, whose
physiognomies and demeanors were sufficiently contrasted, though
harmonized by a common culture and deportment. The table—the stucco
block we have mentioned—was itself a picture of bounty and refined
effects. A large golden _epergne_ shaped as a cornucopia borne in the
arms of tritons on the back of a silver wave, stood at its centre,
holding a tumultuous wealth of roses, the table itself was covered
with a delicate sheeny diaper of silver threads, a _chef d’oeuvre_
of eastern workmanship, found by Robert Lorimer in a bazaar on the
east side of New York a tantalizing and wonderful mixture of linen
and metallic filaments, teazed into a low relief, on which figured
peacocks and weeping willows by sweeping streams; and the service
was—at the moment when we are called upon to observe it—made up of
faintly golden chased Bavarian glass, with old Sevres china.
At the head of the table sat Julieta Lorimer, the mother of Helen,
and the singing Andalusian orange gatherer of Robert’s youthful days;
on either side of this still beautiful woman were two contrasted
figures, one a Catholic clergyman wearing a clerical garb in which
the distinction of the wearer among the princes of the church was
simply denoted by the red buttons on his vest. Facing this dignitary
was a tall and foreign looking man with a high forehead that gained
an unnatural prolongation by reason of its retreating lines of hair
with rather somnolent and unresponsive eyes, and the relics of a
constantly vanishing smile. By his side sat his wife, a flourishing
and elderly lady somewhat over dressed and wearing a complexion of
surprising brightness and vivacity. Facing this personage and by the
side of the cardinal was a handsome man, younger than any of his sex
in the room, abundantly supplied with soft flowing chestnut hair,
having pleasant and scrutinizing eyes, a mouth of much mobility, a
matured moustache, and hands peculiarly well shaped, which, at the
moment, were drawn together before him, resting on the table while
his half turned head looked, as did all the rest of the company,
towards the sixth member of the party who had left her chair at the
opposite end of the board, from her mother, and now stood at the
foot of the Perugino Madonna, from whose sheenless surface her face
was just withdrawn, as she returned the attention of the company and
spoke. It was Helen Lorimer herself.
A very inattentive observer of the human face and form would have
been arrested by the figure before us, and his interest would have
noted the enhancement given to both by dress and action. A gown of
blue silk bound with a belt of meshed gold, held by a Chinese buckle
framing a carved, apple-green jadeite, the waist fitting loosely
and falling away from an uncovered neck encircled by a thrice wound
necklace of pearls, with sleeves slightly _epanché_, trimmed with a
gold thread, and covering tightly closed undersleeves of Irish lace,
that were kept to the wrists by two hyacinth bracelets, arrayed
this unusual person; and, as the observer’s eyes traveled upward to
the face his admiration might have passed through various phases
of approval, wonder, or delight, according to his years, and the
temperamental warmth of his appreciation of a woman’s beauty. The
face was moulded in ample lines, it carried the impress of generous
impulses, it was full and strong, but in no measure lost thereby
the imprint of a delicate and lovely femininity. Soft folds of dark
brown hair, gathered at the back of the head in a chignon, and
plaited over the forehead in rather high folds, were decorated by
two side combs of filagree gold enriched with garnets, between which
and over the chignon itself rose a twig of silver, jewelled with
red tourmalines. The hair so sumptuously arranged became the lovely
visage it framed. The noticeable impression of its shortness was
caused by the full cheeks deeply colored and wearing the complexion
of the south, but, that observation passed, the mind fastened upon
the glowing and tender eyes, that, by some habit of their owner, at
moments half shut, as if in reverie, and then opened slowly with
ravishing smiles that played around them, and lingered long enough
to permit the parted mouth to close, and reveal its rosy cushions,
which did not become voluptuously weak, but formed themselves into an
organ fitted for speech and for caresses. The nose was straight and
firm, not pronounced, not lending to the face the repugnant sense of
intellectualism; the ears were small and shell-like, barely detected
beneath the encompassing hair; her hands, raised in description,
were perhaps characterized by strength, perhaps a little broad, but
finely veined, long fingered, facile, and gracious, and wearing, as
she stands under the madonna, two rings, on the right hand, a spinel
solitaire and a diamond marquise. And her voice?—that most excellent
thing—it completes our capitulation! It is the mingled tones of a
rich contralto and the lower registers of the soprano, perhaps it
was too sweet and only seemed to gain the requisite steadiness of
authority, when raised in pitch, and urged by some dominant emotion.
The whole composition was one of character and physical charm,
with the accompanying color values of artistic dress and a noble
environment.
“Yes,” said the voice in which was vibrant a reminiscent joy, “it
was at Florence that father saw the advertisement of the sale of
this picture. I remember the evening that, as the sun embrowned the
Palazzo Vecchio, in a gorgeous sunset over the distant Piedmont
hills, we drove to the auction room in the Via Brunelleschi, and
found the room crowded with a discordant mixture of English, French,
Italians, and a few rather timid Americans upon whom however, the
discrete auctioneer placed his hopes of establishing a profitable
standard of value for his pictures. It was amusing enough. Father
was determined to have the picture because I told him I liked it,”
and here the eyes drooped, and then the play of smiles, “but he ran
against an equally determined Englishman. I think he must have had
a daughter who liked it too. Well the auctioneer was in a frenzy of
happiness trailing his bait before two such promising prizes—when
suddenly there were no more bids,” the laugh again, “and then I
saw that the Englishman and father had recognized each other; they
made some signal and declined of be used against each other for the
auctioneer’s advantage. And the last bid was not from either father
or the Englishman. The owner of the picture had made it himself. The
picture was not sold that evening; in reality, the owner was its
purchaser, but the next day the auctioneer came to father and said
something about the ‘regrettable incident’ and offered it to father
at his own terms. And so it came to America.”
Miss Lorimer had returned to her seat and the company again
readjusted themselves to their former positions. We may pause a
moment to make the individuals of this company better known. The
cardinal was the recently elected prelate Monsignor Fenton of Newark,
N. J., the tall man with his wife, Count and Countess Schinazi of
Hungary, and the handsome young American, Professor Dale of the
New York City college, a philosopher in his own behalf, and the
instructor of metaphysical youth.
“An entertaining and serviceable story indeed,” said the cardinal as
he touched his lips with the Chartreuse in a sparkling thimble of
red and gold, “but I expected you would let us know what reference
that had to the subject nearest to my own heart—the subjection of the
Church in Italy, which my daughter,” and the speaker half oblivious
of the rest turned to Helen Lorimer with a paternal gesture of
affection, “is a subject not lightly considered by yourself.”
Miss Lorimer leaned back in her chair, a tide of color deepened in
her face, an interior light added a stranger power of beauty to her
face, seeming to issue from her eyes, and she assumed such an ardor
of expectancy that the young professor gazed at her with a deliberate
and not altogether courteous absorption. Her seriousness quickly
disappeared, she moved forward, and raising the cordial to her lips
invited the group in a tone of raillery to drink in a bond of secrecy.
“Yes, I have a secret and you shall know it, but what the Cardinal, I
think, wishes you all to hear is something that happened after father
bought the picture.”
The cardinal demurred, just a trifle, saying that “he had not had the
story so much in mind, as some discussion of the savage intolerance
of the enemies of the Church, a topic of some interest to Miss
Lorimer and himself, and not distantly connected with the secret Miss
Lorimer referred to,” and the prelate again turned to the Chartreuse
appreciatively, and smiled at the matron at his side.
Julieta interrupted, “Tell the story, Helen; I remember it faintly,
but I do recall the excitement it threw your father in, and how
quickly it ended our visit in Florence. That was ten years ago; how
time flies!” and a shadow of pain, that all noticed, crossed the
speaker’s face, vanishing almost before seen, as she with a gesture
of encouragement looked up again at her daughter.
The Countess Schinazi raised her glasses inquiringly, and then
touched the arm of her husband who had been subjected to the same
entrancement which kept the young American speechless, and wondering;
“Alfred, ten years ago we were at the baths at Carlsbad, and don’t
you remember,” she dropped the glasses and tapped her dreaming
spouse a little more sharply on the shoulder, who turned to her with
the vanishing smile undergoing a peculiar expansion that threw the
lower portion of his physiognomy into an ocean of creases; “we were
at dinner with the young Misses Tarbox, when their brother came in
and said there was a report that Robert Lorimer had been killed in
Florence? Can’t you recall that?” and the tap became so sharp a
punctuation in his side, that Count Schinazi exploded volubly; “Veree
vell, my dear, veree vell. It was an occasion of some interest to me.
I svallowed a peach pit.” The laugh was general, the count’s chronic
risibility developed to his eyebrows, and the countess oscillated
with pleasure.
“It is evident that the story must be disposed of,” continued Miss
Lorimer, and her eyes moved pleasantly from the professor to the
cardinal, and back again lingering, it might have been observed, a
little longer on the former, “You see father, after he had finished
with the auctioneer, went back to the sales-room to give some
directions as to the packing and address, and to be quite sure that
the picture he had really bought, would be the one which would be
shipped. Pardon,” turning with a deprecatory smile to her Hungarian
guests, “the intimation, but these mistakes have occurred. Next to
the sales-room there had been a meeting of anarchists the night
previous, and somehow one of the speakers had alluded to the fact
that a rich American, an oppressor of the poor in his own country,
had bought at the auction then going on, an expensive painting of the
Pope, which in his opinion should be destroyed, and not be permitted
to go to a new land, to spread the seeds of superstition. Those were
his very words, as reported in the Florentine papers;” the cardinal
flushed, and he reviewed the company with a hasty and indignant
glance; “Father identified the painting, and later in the day watched
its removal. A little remnant of the anarchistic meeting was present
as the picture came out from the house, and as it was put on the
wagon to be taken away these men, as if by prearrangement rushed
on the men carrying it, and driving them off, began to hammer and
hack at the box, shouting, ‘_death to the enemy of our country_,’”
the cardinal’s eyes were now riveted on the fair woman, who was
herself conscious of his inspection, “Father saw the melee, and ran
among them, denouncing the outrage. Incensed at the interruption the
marauders attacked him, and he was knocked down and kicked, and then
the _gendarmes_ flew to the spot, and the demonstration was over,
with the culprits in the hands of the police. Father appeared against
them and they were fined. That is the story.”
“Ignorance inflamed by malice, flattering itself with the empty
nostrums of a shallow and conceited pedantry, torments—and will
torment—the church,” was the sententious reflection of the cardinal.
“And yet,” broke in the Professor, whose voice while very clear,
with the best enunciation of an American scholar, had a most musical
quality, a peculiar fluty cadence that caught the ear quickly; it was
not lost on the cardinal, and it brought a stare on the countess’s
face that meant worlds; “and yet, is not the church much to blame for
the enmity it provokes; has it wisely construed its responsibility
to the advance of human knowledge? Was it sagacious, or, less
obsequiously, was it just, to excommunicate Father Alfred Loisy at
the instigation of the superior of the Jesuits, at the beginning of
the last century, when the conflict raged over the attitude of the
church towards what was contemptuously termed modernism? The vulgar
tirades of street agitators, and the taunts of mere worldlings are
indeed despicable, but must the church remain impregnable to thought?”
“The church,” answered the cardinal, who was now thoroughly aroused,
and who, as he spoke, kept his eyes fastened on Helen Lorimer, “is
impregnable to guesses which pass for thought. It never forgets its
mission or its commission, one is to save the world—as far as it
can—the other is a divine consecration which keeps it imperturbably
within its office amid the turmoil and the tempests of contemporary
arguments. What is modernism? It has been a texture of speculations,
and practically, as far as the church antagonizes it, it has meant
the dethronement of God, so far as his creative functions are
involved, and its exculpation is what it is pleased to call the
testimony of the rocks. Nothing in physics or chemistry is alien to
religious feeling, but the process of detraction and subtraction
which reads Evolution for God is intolerable. Against a determinate
evolution the church may have little objection; it is itself an
example of determinate evolution. Newman showed that.”
“Pardon me, but I tink,” interjected the Count, while the countess
viewed him with an irrepressible pride, “I tink that the church is
as you say here in America all right. But I tink it is veery old and
just a leetle sick. It might, I tink, as you say in America ‘get
a fresh hold’ if the Pope came right here, here in these states,
vere he might be, as you say in America, a leetle more chesty, more
independent, more free, more, what you say, ‘on the job.’”
Julieta smiled, the countess frankly laughed, Helen looked musingly
at her plate, the professor was mystified, the cardinal glanced an
instant at the speaker with a fleeting expression of scorn, and the
count himself, plainly a comedian, kept the vestiges of his smile
forcibly confined to the corners of his mouth.
Again the cardinal spoke and again he directed his remarks to the
professor, while his eyes sought those of Helen Lorimer.
“As a metaphysician are you quite sure that the reports of your
senses are real, that the so-called phenomena of the world are
indubitably, profoundly, essentially true. Is a cartload of bones in
the Cretaceous as really as much of a fact as the thirst and asking
of your own soul, as the hunger after righteousness, for which there
can be no permanent assuagement outside of the postulate of God, and
some sort of authorized convention between him and man?”
The professor turned to his critic, and said with a smile that was
urbanity itself, “My dear cardinal, as a metaphysician I am not
averse to regarding the world and the reports of our senses from
several points of view, but as a natural human being I unquestionably
bow to the requirements of my environment and have no more doubt
as to the reality of all that geology tells us than I have of the
desirable existence of our hostess,” bowing to Julieta, “or the
charm of her daughter, or the necessary functions of your own
zealous service to those of your faith, and I think that the church
misjudges her prerogatives if she regards the cartload of bones from
the Cretaceous with anything else than the gravest interest, and is
prepared to accept their witness to something, as sacredly as she now
ascribes meaning to the words of revelation.”
The cardinal fidgetted a little, fingering his chartreuse, and
audibly murmured, “Philosophy inside a classroom and common sense
outside of it, are, it seems, to be irreconcilable aspects of life to
the end of the chapter.”
It was then that the voice of Miss Lorimer rich and full, captured
the ears of the disputants as she leaned over towards the professor
with a smile of reconciliation; “My friends, while the fruit is being
served to you, let me monopolize your attention to the confession
of a secret of mine own, which the cardinal knows about, and which
curiously the count has most recklessly invaded, though I bear him no
ill will on that account,” and she extended her hand deprecatingly
towards that pleased personage.
“I am sure ze company vill be much in my debt Mees Lorimer, if I
haf ze honor to have forced you, as you say in the politic, to, to
disgorge,” and the count with an ineffable grin of amusement and
satisfaction over his verbal conquest leaned back in his chair,
while the countess in a tone of petulant cajolery, waved at him with
her glasses, saying, “Really, Schinazi, you are too ridiculous,” a
reproach which developed the count’s smile as far as the ends of his
twisted moustache.
The chairs were drawn somewhat closer to the table and Miss Lorimer
continued, “Doesn’t it seem true to you all that occasions are
created to be used, and that those who use them make history. An
opportunity missed means a disfigured, or abortive, at least, record
perhaps for an individual, perhaps for a nation. Now, perhaps I will
offend you, Count, it seems to me that Europe is growing very old,
that its interest is in its memories; its energy is traditional
only. A breath would destroy it. The chastening power of revolution
has been felt there, but since 1790 no strong and lasting currents
of feeling have done much to change its political surface. Russia
is hopelessly inert, stiffened into inaction after its anxieties at
the beginning of the last century. Life there is a routine, death a
release. Faith has vanished because faith in living, in thinking, in
being, in doing has vanished too. It is a tomb of ruins, peopled by
sacristans, threaded by tourists: is it not a rubbish heap, in which
by dint of digging one can find mementoes of greatness, but where any
splendors of the spirit no longer can be described, much less felt?
Is it not wrong to leave the fountain head of our religion—yours and
mine, Cardinal—in a choked up and littered field, where its waters
of healing and life run the serious risk of being hidden in the dust
of neglect and the refuse of abuse? My secret, friends, is to bring
the Pope to this land of ours where life, movement, action, progress,
ideals, thought, play over every thing and where even the things we
hate or oppose have color and look alive?”
The silence that followed this announcement was a tribute to its
novelty, and the listeners appeared to be taking note of their
sensations, as if wondering to what extent they either cared for it,
or approved it. A slightly whimsical smile of interrogation rested on
Miss Lorimer’s face, as she looked at the Count, and perhaps it was
in response to that which made that person first break the silence,
just a little disconcerting to the last speaker.
“I tink, Mees Lorimer, that Europe iz not a charnel house as you
suggest nor edzactly a grave. It iz old, it iz a leetle, as you say,
played out. It iz tired. A good many peoples haf lived and died
there, and it iz monotinous to go on doing ze same thing so long. I
tink the trouble just now in Europe iz that she go to sleep and haf
nightmares.” The Countess glowing abundantly as she watched with
transparent happiness her husband move along the slippery path of his
elocution, led the laugh, “But it vill vake up; it iz imposs—ible dot
someting not happen—and soon veery quvick. Dere vill be what you call
a ‘meex-up,’ and den de Europe spring up, and shout, and jump up, and
cry _Allons_; I tink so.”
Professor Dale who had eagerly watched the count with not a trace of
amusement, answered across the table with his eyes still seeking the
count’s,
“Few things could be stranger than the present stupor of Europe. It
is asleep; it has the sleeping sickness. Fifty years ago in 1950 it
looked as if its toy game of kings and queens, and the rattle of its
tin soldiers was coming near an end and the people were responsively
rising to new opportunities. But it passed as a shower passes in
the night, and then deeper, deeper, the spell of a hypnotic apathy
falls, and we hear only its snores, unless as the Count Schinazi
intimates it occasionally screams at a bad dream.”
“Theodore, just the other day,” it was the pleasantly modulated
voice of Julieta, “read me a strange impeachment of Europe. It said
that Europe had become paralyzed; music and painting and literature
had come to America, and it pictured an ancient hearthstone in an
artist’s studio with chairs and instruments and easels exquisitely
made, and with a fire burning with a comforting invitation, but with
no artists, no hands to guide the strings or the brushes, and only an
old janitress looking curiously in at the half open door, while her
cat strayed forward and slept at the fire’s edge.”
“I don’t pretend to be able to talk about such things,” alertly
interjected the Countess, “but really, you know, I feel that Europe
is a play ground, a big show, an expensive continental museum with
regimentals and dressed things walking up and down and rattling
their spurs and saluting, amid splendid old palaces, and lakes with
charmed boats and rivers, fixed up with castles, and all kept going
you see, as long as America pays for the machinery and the orchestra;
Bless me! I shouldn’t say such things in the Count’s hearing, except
that as a breeder of Game Cocks in America he still honors a line
of warriors;” the malignant sally, that practically put the entire
company in a quandary, was not resented by the Count, whose smile
escaping its seclusion behind his curled moustache, as if with the
levity of an unusual freedom, spread to the roots of his hair and
the back of his ears. This benignity kept every thing in place, and
it was the intellectual accent of the Cardinal that next solicited
attention.
“Europe to-day at the beginning of the twenty-first century has
the _rigor mortis_. Its genius and talent follows the incentive
of gain. They come _here_ and they thrive. One hundred years have
administered to us an enormously enlarged culture and it insatiably
pulls from Europe every promising blade of creative power. The
stimulus of applause, of an augmented audience, and in no vulgar
sense is here also. The battle ground of opinion is here. Our hard
and boisterous crudities are passed, we are no longer menaced with
alien segregations, the ethnic problem has vanished, not altogether
by solution, but in nature, like some mythic tree, we bear many kinds
and many colors of flowers, as it were; a modified Italian—but still
Italian—rose here, a changed French—but still French—lily there, a
new Hebraic artichoke—but still Jewish—on this bough, and a less
redolent German hibiscus—but still German—on that, and all fed,
and rejoicingly fed, from the same national root. We have become
cosmic, and in our land the final clash of the conflict of opinions
approaches, unless indeed this fagged out earth is doomed to an
eternal struggle with the battle grounds changed from continent to
continent. Science and Religion offer their clues to the central
mysteries. The measure of their values is determined _here_. I think
Miss Lorimer’s plea should be respected. Let the Pope—the Head of the
Church—come to close quarters with his antagonist, the Apollyon of
material Lust, and of intellectual denial.”
“Thank you, Cardinal,” it was again the voice of the first speaker,
“I almost thought that my audacious fancy, bold as it was, had been
covered up, and thereby just a little abashed, by reflections that
were intended to keep us from considering it at all. Every one was
jumping the traces, and running a field. Yes! shall we bring the Pope
to America?”
“Quevstion! quevstion!” murmured the Count, like the impatient
voters at a primary, while the cardinal with an exorbitant curiosity
painting itself upon his expressive countenance, looked around the
table, the goal of his scrutiny evidently being the Professor, and
the unrebuked silence continued, until, as if answering the voiceless
implication that it was he who should break it, the Professor said;
“Yes! the challenge has been often given; Let it be accepted, where
the swords of both duellists are near enough to each other to not
only strike fire, but to give the _coup de grace_.”
This truculence was perhaps a little harsh for the occasion,
and Professor Dale felt its awkwardness; he turned blushing to
his neighbor; “Pardon, Miss Lorimer, but the Cardinal is an
uncompromising foe, and I suppose,” leaning to the Cardinal, “the
Church would prefer death to sufferance?”
“Hardly,” answered the prelate, “the Church has often prospered upon
little more than toleration, but on the other hand if it came to
Science, asking for sufferance, it would be told to close its doors.”
“But vy! vy!” and the Count’s voice rose with a compromising
seriousness, “dere is room for every ting, dis and dis, and dat and
dat, and so ve grow a beeg, beeg, rug, vith a tousand colors and
tousand threads, and on it the centuries come and go, and eet nefer,
nefer wear out,” the ardent Hungarian had an inspired look, and his
wife who apparently compensated him for her snubs, by an unimpaired
adulation whenever he opened his mouth, became visibly grave, and
dispensed a glance around the table, as if in admonition of his
captivating simile.
“Well! Speaking of rugs,” said the Cardinal dryly “they are
associated in my mind with Turks, and Turks are not the most
desirable citizens; they certainly are not members of the Church,
and a national rug of a thousand threads and colors is only another
metaphor for chaos.”
“You mean Cardinal,” said the Professor, “that the Count’s
promiscuous carpet, would never harmonize in color or design with the
tapestries of the Church?”
“Perhaps,” gaily rejoined Miss Lorimer, “I can twist the Count’s rug
into an image that suits the Cardinal and myself better. It shall
have a thousand colors and a thousand threads—ten thousand for that
matter—but they will not make a miscellaneous and inconsequent woof;
they will form a beautiful and gracious figure,” and the lady smiled
as if there then floated before her mind’s eye something that fled
from the profanation of a name.
The company rose with probably a different conclusion as to the value
and meaning of Miss Lorimer’s disclosure, resting in the mind of
each. But it dwelt with a singular poignancy of interest with two,
and one of these, at least, lavished upon it a wealth of improving
comment.
Scarcely had the group with gliding step reached the entrance of the
grand chamber, and the attendant had drawn aside the curtains which
revealed as they parted the noble stairway descending to a lower
plane, constituted by a wide hall now enveloped in a golden glow,
that descended from an electric corona, almost two stories above it;
from which again suites of rooms extended to the right and to the
left,—scarcely, had this moment arrived, when a resounding rap smote
the front door of the hall, and, as a servant darted towards this
entrance, the door itself was pushed from the outside, and the tall
figure of a handsome elderly man entered. The face of the stranger
was disturbed, and he flung down his walking stick with a gesture of
despair. The next moment he raised his eyes to the arrested guests,
and repressing his impatience moved to the foot of the stairway and
spoke;
“Ah! my friends you must pardon my absence. It was not intentional. I
see too well what pleasures I have missed. Of course Helen explained
to you that I was called away down town to attend a meeting of
directors of the bank, who are negotiating with the city for the
latter’s accommodation of a loan. The meeting was interrupted by an
alarm, that proved only too true, that the socialists had started
a tremendous riot on the East side, and that fire, incendiary in
origin, and attributed to them, had broken out in several quarters.
Your lecture hall, Helen, where you have attempted your propaganda of
the Divine Mission of Wealth, is burned down, and those scoundrels
of The Beehive have doubtless had a hand in it. It was a compliment
gratuitously offered to yourself, but I think it has in it the darker
meaning of a menace. Come to the porch and see the signs of the
Future.”
It was Theodore Lorimer, Helen’s uncle, who spoke, and the company,
quickly assenting to this invitation hastened down the steps, and
moved out upon the front terrace, lit by the electric globes upon
their pillars. From this point an actual fire could not be descried,
but the skies south and east beyond the intervening ridges were
plainly illuminated, the light rising and falling, and at its highest
intensity, as it scored the low lying banks of clouds with reflected
flashes, it revealed the summits of high buildings that momentarily
spanned the firelight beyond them with black columns.
Theodore Lorimer led the company to the railing of the enclosure, and
it so happened that the Professor found himself standing beside Miss
Lorimer, between two of the marble pillars. Her face was discernible
and it bore the marks of a kind of subdued anguish. She looked at him
and pointed to the horizon growing more and more lurid; “Are these
lights indeed signs of the Future as my uncle has said?”
Something intensely tender burned in the Professor’s eyes as he
answered softly; “Miss Lorimer I do not know—but when the Pope comes
we shall see whether they go out or whether they burn higher.”
“Ah!” answered Miss Lorimer, “You mock us,” and she came closer to
him with her hands clasped.
“Mockery!” he rejoined, “Mockery! Surely mockery ill suits one who
may become a supplicant, perhaps a penitant,” and the professor’s
voice had a rueful accent, and his face looked at hers with ever
so slight a glance of passion, from which she turned away with the
faintest possible sigh of disappointment.
CHAPTER IV
THE SUICIDARIUM
Tom Ratler had been almost a week at the Kohinoor, and as yet no
intimation had come to him that he was wanted in the vast gregarious
city, that grew to him more and more monstrous, and rapidly put
on the form and functions of a maelstrom; a maelstrom where life,
property, reputation, were engulfed, again momentarily to reappear,
as if the regurgitation of the whirlpool shot its human victims back
to the surface, to enjoy a new glimpse of respectability before
they finally were sucked under, forever carried away in underground
sluices to the merciful and impersonal ocean of oblivion.
Or else at other instants the city seemed to him a kaleidoscope with
its human occupants, its myriad fancies of design and architecture,
its dissipations, its gluttonies, even its piety and all the agencies
of its philanthropic life thrown round in a spinning circle,
confusedly glimmering and changing color, from which too arose an
accompanying roar of voices, not unfrequently punctured with cries of
pain, not always without passages of music.
Tom had made friends cautiously, from a sense of danger, and with
some agitated memories of what he had read in books. At first
the number of social advances to him were suspiciously numerous,
and he somewhat indiscriminately classed them as a concerted
conspiracy upon his pocket book. That indispensable support had
already considerably shrunken, vanquished into a sort of querulous
obedience to the gestures of necessity in the glittering Kohinoor
and to the no less unavoidable gestures of its dazzling occupants.
He later recognized that his own personality, with a good face and
the evidences of a trained and equipped body, had much to do with
these social advances. Among the friends or acquaintances whom
he, by a companionable sense of mere liking, had chosen as more
exactly intimates was a young man, who confided to him at a moment
of especial expansion, that he was connected, in a business way,
with the most extraordinary of the many features of the multivarious
city. It was nothing less than a _suicidarium_ of which Tom had heard
something from the Mayor’s secretary, and which he knew was one
of the forbidden extravagances in New York. The information given
to him by his young friend, was to the effect, that enough people
who wished to die for diverse reasons, connected with all sorts of
experiences could be found in the City to assure the maintenance
of this grewsome institution. The young man was himself engaged in
the work of making a peculiar heavy and lethal gas or vapor, which
was used in accomplishing the appalling end. Tom naturally recoiled
from the horrible idea of ending life, and could hardly believe the
story of his friend that these outfits variously designed, and of
varying degrees of elegance and size, had proven to be profitable
enterprises, because of the exorbitant prices paid for so abhorrent
and hideous a purpose. It required considerable persuasion on the
man’s part to bring Tom to an acceptance of an invitation to visit
the scene of this unnatural conduct.
He went with some misgivings, but he went at last actually fascinated
by the incredible weirdness of thought, so unspeakable and strange.
His friend—Edward Links, or Ned—took him by the subway far up to the
end of the Island of Manhattan, at the old Kingsbridge, where the
place, disguised as a shabby tenement on the outside, was situated.
And as Tom approached it, somewhat separated from the other houses
around it, and on the edge of the Spuyten Duyvil creek—offering,
as Ned explained, a convenient way for the conveyance of the dead
to their sepulture, or to the cremator—on the opposite bank—it
unmistakably presented the familiar aspects of a dilapidated and
almost abandoned tenement. It was a little too long, and some of its
dilapidation looked made up for the occasion; displaced clapboards,
perforations and disfiguring splashes of mud applied to its sides,
the forcibly wrenched doors, the broken windows, broken beyond any
possible reconcilement with their human uses, all gave it a rather
contrived appearance. This might not have been obtruded upon the
casual passer-by, though men and women were moving in and out of it,
but it was detected by Tom quite quickly, and he asked his friend
if people couldn’t see it was a “blind,” especially the trained and
unsympathetic optics of the police.
“Well yes and no! You see it’s this way. There is a good deal of
swagger in the business, and joining the majority this way means
a clean spill of a thousand, or anyhow five hundred spielers. Now
you wouldn’t believe it, but the applications are thicker than they
can accommodate, sometimes. It all depends. Epidemics, failures,
panics, love-matters, all work in spells, and when they happen to
come together why they just run over each other to get the quietus
they talk about in the playhouse. Not here. Oh no. The game is on the
Q. T., and the proposals and assignments come in at the office down
town. Well as I was saying it pays, and it pays the police to have a
kind of blind eye for the hock shop; that’s the name for the outfit
here, though it goes among the squad as The Oblivion, a pretty name,
but nothing to the point.
“I don’t so much care for the job, but it pays good, and I don’t have
to see things, but just switch on gas and wait. It’s risky. Every
mother’s son of us would be pinched and run to jail, if they nabbed
us. What helps the whole affair is a kind of talk that goes on now
in certain papers and journals about the emptiness of life, and a
funny fancy that they all come back and get better places. It isn’t
a bit bad how they do it. You’ll see, and I guess that some kinds
of men and women, who have just about squeezed all they know how to
get out of life, get a sort of faint heartedness and sickness, and
kinder fetch up here with a jerk, bunch it together, and let ’er go.
Horrible ain’t it? But it’s slick, slicker than a wet rat. You just
see. It’s a kind of a dream.”
They came to the piazza that extended along the front of the
slovenly domicile, its floor rent and gaping, and some of the
pillars supporting its roof weakened by decay, while the windows and
blinds broken, torn, and dismantled completed the rather overwrought
imitation of poverty and disorder. As Ned Links approached the place,
his companion noticed his nervous inspection of the neighborhood, and
when with a whistle he turned to the tenement, and stepped within one
of its open hallways, Tom saw to his astonishment a slight unevenness
in its floor move upward, exposing a trap door, and beneath it
descending steps. Tom felt indeed he had embarked upon an adventure
appropriately theatrical and strange, enough so to satisfy his
romantic fancies, and even the mingled odors reaching his nostrils
from the aperture, in which a kind of fragrance was not unnoticed,
added a peculiar zest of danger.
Ned caught the door of the opening and held it up as he motioned
to Tom to descend. Tom, with no misgivings of danger, but with a
slightly sickened heart obeyed, and observed a female figure rather
carelessly dressed, or less equivocally, rather immodestly undressed,
going before him. It was her hands that had lifted the door for their
entrance. The female did not turn her head but she held above it a
small glass lamp, which vouchsafed sufficient light to enable her
visitors to follow, and it was not too dim for Tom’s observation,
that the woman before him was comely and unabashed. Her occasional
backward glances were lighted by very becoming smiles, and Tom,
under their ravishment, failed to notice that they were treading
a very narrow and damp passage, and that it was leading downward
upon a rather steep grade. The opportunity for such observations
was suddenly checked by their reaching the end of the defile, and
stopping abruptly at a door. The door opened, and Tom, with Ned
upon his heels, and with some unmannerly pressure upon the giggling
maiden, whose dishevelment became more and more pronounced, shot into
a room or an enclosure before whose strange features at first dimly
descried, but in an instant later revealed in a dazzlement of light,
as the bacchante touched a button which sent an electric thrill into
thousands of little lamps, Tom fairly gasped in astonishment.
He seemed to have walked into a bower of shrubs, flowers, and
low trees, under whose protecting shade couches were carelessly
distributed, while everywhere a rosy light cast its softening
illumination, enchanting the eye with tinted fantasies as where he
saw a stream of water lisping among rocks, just perceptibly stained
with the pink sheen, or where a marble grotto, opening at the end of
a gravel walk, bordered with tulips, caught on its flaring white lips
the same delicate blush. Ned and the girl withdrew a little, while
they watched the bewildered stranger, turning with new wonder to the
points of this sunken garden, and Ned was not loth to intimate his
irrepressible satisfaction by facetious antics behind Tom’s back,
some of which could only be described as evidences of his personal
infatuation for his companion.
But Tom was not long intimidated by his strange surroundings, and
had already begun to walk forward over a yellow gravelled path that
wound through a sward magically gleaming with a light that appeared
to radiate from its innumerable blades of grass. He had hardly gone
four steps forward, when a blast of air struck him, and sent his hat
whirling off among the branches of a flowering almond tree, while his
discomfiture was hailed with hearty approval by the shouting Ned and
the indulgent and favoring maiden. Tom received another surprise. He
sprang to the flowering almond shrub that looked gracefully real,
and on whose crowded flowers the rosy light fell, imparting a fairy
glamour to its petals. His hat was caught in the slender limbs,
and Tom raised his hand to recover it, clasping the tree trunk for
that purpose. The tree trunk under the pressure of his body swayed
forward and broke, while Tom rolled over in the confusion of boughs,
and the tumbling counterfeit entrapped him in wire, strips of painted
linen, paper corollas, wax leaves, in short the paraphernalia of
a clever imitation, put up consummately, and only one part of the
wondrous mimicry about him. This last incident was greeted with
more boisterous shouts by Ned and the young woman, who not loth to
increase the stranger’s dismay pelted him with theatrical pebbles
picked up from the banks of the theatrical rivulet where indeed the
sibilant water belonged to nature, but where everything else was an
artful disguise of paper, plaster, and pigment.
Tom extricated himself and in great good humour rejoined his friends.
He realized now that he had entered a subterranean theatre which
as he gazed around him assumed the proportions of a beautiful
picture. Its deceptive nature disappeared in the sickly radiance,
while the artifice of invention had been exhausted in completing a
fascinating illusion. And the picture had been skillfully composed.
It represented a blending of features whose mixture, unified under
the strange purpose of arresting life, lulled the spirit, through the
senses, into a dreamy languor. By means of the hushed and crowded
visions thus summoned or inwardly created, the surrender of the will
was gently accomplished. The opiate of a luxurious feeling, swayed
ever so discretely into an anticipation of delights just dawning in
the Life to Come, dwelt with increasing pressure on the swooning
and dying clients of this strange hostelry. For the means and the
methods were ruthlessly explained to Tom by his new friend, and Tom
responding intuitively to the more poetic suggestions around him,
almost resented Ned’s commonplace coarseness, and rude matter-of-fact
indifference. To Ned the Suicidarium was a business episode, and the
awful ghastliness of its work, a detail of commercial manipulation,
so hardened had he become to its tragic consequences. To Tom’s
less sodden nature, while he shrank with healthy repulsion from its
meaning, yet as the scene grew into a congruous whole—artificial as
it was—the mystery of its work somehow reflected a wonderfulness upon
it all, as the exhalation of a perfume sometimes makes a poisoned air
salubrious.
The deep pit lay in the dolomitic limestone of the north end of
Manhattan Island, at a point not far removed from the splendid
encrustation of Carrara upon the Inwood Ridge. It had been deeply
dug, and its lateral extensions stretched far beyond the limits of
the sordid tenement that, like a rag upon a jewelled shawl, covered
its entrance from the upper streets. It combined the features of a
Japanese garden and a Grecian theatre, and it was enclosed by the
rising walls of stone, up which its numerous lamps sent streaks
and fluttering bands of light, lost at last somewhere above in a
canopying sky, wherein the implanted and clustering spots of light
simulated a waiting Heaven. The Japanese garden, with bridges,
dwarfed cedars, clambering wistarias, painted hedges, yellow walks,
and white buddhas perched upon iron trellises, was carefully
developed. Stone seats under overhanging peach and plum trees were
draped with a green gauze that invited the rueful guests to await
there their sepulchral summons, closing their eyes delightedly upon a
picture of shimmering loveliness. Further towards one side, the floor
of the apartment abruptly fell a few feet, and here was a marble
amphitheatre almost bare of vegetation, lustrous in its polished
whiteness, holding banks of gray stone seats, and descending to an
arena of colored pebbles, beyond which again a stage inclosed in
glass was seen, now empty and dark.
Tom and Ned, the latter encircling the lascive lass who leaned upon
him with an embracing arm about his neck, stood at the back of the
highest tier of seats, and here Ned poured out the torrent of his
explanations.
“You see Tom these quitters come here at night, and they have a
banquet just below there on those colored sands and they eat and
drink, about as they like, and a good many take the booze pretty
straight, and aren’t half more than all there when the gas hits ’em.
Others just sit around and listen to the music, and then the fans are
slowly turned on—that was a fan that blew your roof off—and the gas
flows in, and they get softened like, while the girls do the angel
act on that stage, there behind the winders,” and Ned took a more
convincing hold of the assenting lady, who presumably had something
to do with the “angel act,” though there was little in her generous
outlines that comported seriously with the conventional frail figures
of the disembodied; “the girls come in there, and swim around with
gauzy flippers on their shoulders, and there is a lot of singing,
and then colored lights, and the gas keeps on, and the people grow
delirious, just as though they had eaten hasheesh, and sing and talk
and dance, and then they fall down any where, and they ‘pass over’
just like that,” and Ned snapped his fingers, kissed the girl, and
jerked Tom to one side, and hurried him down a central corridor which
led through the stone steps of the amphitheatre, and all, just as a
heavy and sweetened bell slowly tolled the hour of six.
The girl ran before them and turned into the stage at a side door,
which she pushed open, while Ned with gestures of despair hurried Tom
away in another direction up a good copy of a ragged defile, leading
to the diminutive cliff that sheltered the ineffective grotto, from
which issued the rippling waters of the more effective brook. At the
top of this alpine ascent, Ned shoved Tom into a cavity which proved
to be a kind of trap door leading into a laboratory which was the
work shop of the chemist and where the lethal gas was made, whose
poisonous vapors inundated the spaces they had both passed through,
carrying its occupants away on the waves of a vision-making, sense
deadening ecstacy. For Ned explained as he moved between the big
bell-jars, and the stills, and the huge beakers, heaped to their
brims with green and yellow chemicals, that an obscure man had
dreamed long on the problem of manufacturing a gas that would be both
fatal to life when inhaled, and intoxicating to the senses. This
gloomy plodding man buried in his experiments and living upon almost
nothing, often an object of pity to his neighbors, who would force
him from his crucibles and furnaces to take nourishment, had at last
achieved the grand result. He had formed a new organic vapor which
had all these properties, and yielded a pleasant fragrance as well.
It soothed as a narcotic, it stimulated as an intoxicant, it killed
with unswerving certainty, and as its victims inhaled it it roused a
fierce hunger for its subtle influence. “And” concluded Ned, “this
hock-shop is not the only one in the city that uses it. It just cost
a million of dollars to get it from the old man. Funny. He dropped
his chemistry and lives like a lord on Fifth Avenue to-day. He ain’t
much to see, but he certainly has the boodle,” and the reflective
youth sighed with unconcealed envy.
He was loading the green and yellow chemicals from the beakers into
the stills and lighting the bunsen burners beneath them, which slowly
heating the mixture, evolved the colorless gas or vapor which was
then conducted into large chambers, where at first mixed with air
it entered the suicidarium, and was gradually increased in strength
by cutting off the air supply, until the unadulterated flood of its
flow filled the chamber, and the unfortunates who had become tired of
their lives, passed away, drowned in its invisible bath.
Tom asked Ned if the suicidarium was about to be used and Ned,
absorbed in his task, nodded his head affirmatively, and pointing
to a little recess at the end of the narrow and lengthened room, at
length spoke; “Yes it’s off to-night. You can see the whole shindig.
You won’t forget it in a hurry either. Come in back here, have a
snack, and then you just squeeze up in that corner, and flatten your
nose on the window pane and the whole show is yours.”
Tom shuddered at the idea of this abhorrent spectacle, but he felt
too the fascination of the unique experience, and at the moment
nothing would have induced him to relinquish the opportunity.
The snack proved to be a very substantial meal of steak, potatoes,
beer and pie, and when Tom and Ned had done full justice to it under
the repeated admonitions of the latter, that they would be there some
time, and Tom might need a little extra strength for the ordeal, they
both returned to the laboratory, where now one additional helper had
taken his place, and Tom was put at the small aperture covered with
glass, from which at a most advantageous height he commanded the
whole Garden of Death.
It was now about eight o’clock, just the time in the upper sun-lit
world, when, as Tom thought, the twilight was settling down over the
city, and the blaze of the electric arcs were spanning the streets,
and the crowds were pressing in eager haste to enjoy the dissipations
of the night, while his hotel, the magnificent Kohinoor, rose
towering on the sky like a colossal coruscation. As these reminders
chased through his mind he noticed the door at which a few hours ago
Ned and himself had entered the place, open, and a group of men and
women—the latter young and pleasing—came in. The men set about the
work of examining the garden, adjusting here and there disturbed
spots, repairing breaks, smoothing the scarfs over the benches,
testing the lights, opening and shutting the fan doors, until Tom
saw them come to the broken almond tree of his amusing surprise.
Here there was an obvious astonishment and disgust, and then their
movements quickened, and bringing in new material and working with
zeal, the reorganized almond tree again swayed life-like before the
breeze of the fan, and its pink petals again fell softly on the green
turf, or floated upon the ludicrous little brook. Somehow now too a
change in relation to the whole trick came over Tom’s mind, and the
prettiness of the scene changed into something hollow and horrible,
so that he almost was inclined to leave his place and escape if
he could. The confined and excavated garden which at first, under
the shock of discovery, had filled him with a childish delight,
and had actually, so adroitly were its characteristic proportions
arranged, given him an impression of size, now became shrunken,
almost contemptible in the light of its unnatural uses. It was a
scintillating painted harlequinade of deceits, a little theatre
of diseased emotions, in which the morbid emaciated victims of
self-inflicted despair sought a foolish and wicked relief.
He felt like rushing away, and moved back to ask Ned how he might get
out of the horrible hole. But Ned was there at his side. He opened a
window and told Tom to look out:
“The gas doesn’t go in yet. First they have a banquet. You can see
and hear them from here. Then when they have got through, the dances
of the angels begin on that stage, behind the glasses, and then the
gas creeps in; they get intoxicated, and slowly as it grows denser
and thicker they faint and die. They’re coming in now.”
Tom leaned out of the little casement, and as the light glowed again
in full power over the garden, from the pink shades, while all the
glinting lights within the garden shone, he noticed about ten people
passing down the gravel walk among the counterfeit trees and plants
towards the petty amphitheatre. They went down the steps of its
central corridor, and sat on the benches waiting for the banquet. A
table had been placed upon the colored pebbles, in the space before
the stage, and it was rapidly being covered with cold meats, fruits,
and wines. The decorations and service partook of the theatrical
bravado of the rest of the place. There were silver cornucopias,
spilling grapes, oranges, figs, and nuts; silver urns filled with
wine, silver goblets, platters carrying cold meats, savory pickles,
olives, cheeses, jellies and pastes and small tureens of cordials.
White bread was heaped upon silver bowls and flowers were thrown over
everything, covering even the floor upon which the table stood. The
chairs were placed, and the ten strange creatures, who thus prepared
their own doom, took them in silence. Tom could have almost screamed
in his desperation of horror, but he simply clutched Ned, and the two
young men, to whom life seemed so good and desirable, watched the
little group in a stupor of attention. There were indeed just ten.
Tom noted them very distinctly. First at one end of the table sat
a withered sickly old man who was helped to this place by a young
woman, on whose face Tom thought he detected a choreal twitching,
and a moody stare that betokened madness; next to this young woman
sat two masculine wrecks—both men of middle age, their anaemic faces
pallid beneath the lights, and their heads turning bald, and their
listless hands moving fitfully from their faces to their legs, as
they slapped and rubbed the latter, and grimacing between themselves
provoked each other to a dreary sort of smiling, by jokes that failed
to reach the two young men.
Beyond this precious pair who seemed hardly to belong to the grim
company, was a heavy browed, thick haired young man, who kept his
eyes down, his head resting on his hands, and who seemed buried
in his own somber thoughts. He showed a handsome face to his two
attentive watchers, at such times as he lifted his eyes from the
table and looked backward over the amphitheatre and the artificial
garden. Then he seemed to smile, and he turned to his neighbor at
the head of the table, opposite the sickly old man, and spoke, which
caused his acquaintance to rise, and scan the spot with a very
evident interest. This last guest at the feast was a shorter man with
a round head, almost deprived of hair except such persistent wisps
as remained over his ears, or formed a fringe above the nape of his
neck. He had a curiously soured and grim face, and he squinted and
seemed to feel sudden pains in his chest, if the pressure of that
part of his body with both hands might be interpreted as a confession
of suffering. On the opposite side of the table four more figures
completed the assemblage. Of these one was a woman who seemed
ludicrously misplaced in such a group. She was a fat, not uncomely
person, that under less sinister auspices would have been set down by
most people for a prosperous and happy mother of a family, typically
bourgeoise in looks, typically commonplace, contented and impersonal.
Yet there she was, and Tom shuddered to think of it. Next to her
was a rather stout hard faced man who noticed no one but the little
glum man at the head of the table and with whom he was evidently
exchanging remarks. The glum man was short, the hard faced man tall.
The two remaining members of this suicidal gathering were a couple
of young people apparently in love with each other, a young man and
a young woman, and whose desires to leave a world already beginning
to grant them felicity struck Tom as almost more intolerably shocking
than anything else in the dreadful picture.
Some of the young women who later would present their celestial
evolutions on the stage to these tired souls, simulating, Tom knew
not what, of the future states of spirits, were now engaged—arrayed
as nymphs and who did not hesitate to accept the kisses of the men
they plied with wines—in serving the table. The drinking was more
conspicuous than the eating, and some—the young woman and the heavy
browed young man—abstained from both. But the rest were insatiable,
and even as he felt the chill of repulsion over the approaching
tragedy Tom could not repress a shifting smile as he saw the fat
comely woman, the glum philosopher and the hard faced hypochondriac
eat and drink with a gluttonous avidity, that suggested the grotesque
fancy in their minds of feeding well for a long fast. At length
the spirits of the company brightened, and songs and loud talking
betokened their animated condition. Even the sickly old man waved his
arms and his falsetto ululations sounded a forlorn mockery of gayety.
The lovers embraced each other with rapturous excitement, the glum
man stood up and orated, and his broken adjurations were interrupted
by the hard faced man, who smote the table with his fists, and pushed
away the decanters, the goblets, and the vessels near him, in a vast
effort to expand some notion of science or philosophy. The fat woman
sighed, and continued to drink and the two anaemics alternately fell
upon each other’s necks, or struggled to catch the flitting coryphaei
as they passed about the table, adding new delicacies, or filling the
empty wine jars. Only the twitching young woman, and the deep browed
youth maintained any decorum, and it was the latter who at last rose,
and in a deep musical voice commanded silence. Whether he was known,
or whether something stirred the bacchanalian rout to think a moment,
before they plunged into the dark uncertainly of Death, or whether
it was the relapse of satiety and sleepiness, that caused it, the
company became still, and only the voice of the speaker, sounding
with a fullness, that gave to every word that escaped his lips, a
peculiar resonance, was heard.
[Illustration: “PAIN, PAIN, PAIN; NOTHING BUT PAIN.”
_Page 79._]
“My friends,” he began “do you realize that to-night we shall be
together for the last time in this world, and do you care to go out
of it without one word to your companions, on the same journey,
telling them why you leave the world at all in this suicidal way?
With your permission let me at least tell you why I have come here,
what motive stronger than life, places me here with you at this
wretched mockery of a banquet, waiting for the death gas which we
have heard kills while it intoxicates;” the voice became compellingly
sweet and urgent, and the crew before him had turned their eyes up to
his face, apparently really listening with interest.
The speaker continued: “To me at one time nothing seemed so shocking
as death, nothing so unnatural, so hideous. To me this minute nothing
seems more welcome. I hoped in success, in love, to win the bright
things of the earth, as the bright things of the earth go, and I
missed all. Then I turned to friendship, and my friends wounded and
deserted me. I fled to religion, no voice answered my prayers, the
eternal blankness of silence, of disappointment; and nightly around
my couch rose only the spectres of want and desire, unsatisfied
and unappeasable. The sky was as hard as brass, the earth an iron
floor, the air around me without sound, I myself a puzzle or better,
I think, a bubble. I could not endure the stupid drag of monotony,
the abject meanness of life, its tread-mill duties, its sickening
flatness, its vulgarity. I fainted at the thought of a life led in
these tiresome and dusty thoroughfares of commonness, with food
wrenched from the toil of the repeating days; a chain of identical
dumbness from the beginning of the year to the end of it, and then on
and on without alleviation, without interest, without meaning. I end
it, and I end it here to-night.”
He sat down. His example moved the rest, and one by one as far as
they were able or understood their purpose they told their separate
stories. The sickly old man at one end of the table staggered to his
feet, and by dint of support from the waiters, and incessant catching
at the cloth of the table, managed to remain upright while he half
screamed what he had to say: “Yes I want to go too. It’s all pain,
all pain to me; aches all over me; red hot irons go through me; my
feet are blazing with sores; my sides are racked with misery. I can’t
walk; I can’t breathe; I can’t think. Pain, pain, pain; nothing but
pain.” And he sank down doubled up, and almost dropped to the ground
with a shriek.
The glum short man jumped to his feet, and stared around him with
ominous scowls, that set the two anaemics off, roaring with drunken
laughter. But he was not disconcerted; no one so tipsy could have
been. He waved his hands, and then folded them, and stiffly leaning
over the table, began: “I am a philosopher;” this, brought out with
an unmistakable hiccough, gave immense amusement to the two wrecks.
He continued: “I was educated to be a philosopher,” more laughter
“and I know all there is to know about philosophy; but it’s a farce,
it’s a damn lie, the whole of it,” a whack on the table, and a shout
from the wrecks, “philosophy is a fraud, it tells nothing, it’s a
patch work of guesses. I want to know, and I _am_ going to know,
and the only way to know is to go and see. See! See! See!” and the
ruffled philosopher fell over on the loving couple beside him, and,
hotly rejected by the boy, gathered himself together, and stumbled
outward to the gray benches of the amphitheatre.
The turn came next to the hard faced man, who was less enfeebled
by his potations, being in that respect a man of some endurance;
he proclaimed that he was a scientific man, an explorer, an
experimentalist, that he was there in that capacity then, and that
he had a commission to find out the fact of another life; “For,” he
went on, “I am convinced that there is a conservation of forces in
the living matter of the world, just as there is in its energy, and
that if the energy of life is not wearing down, we must come back to
it to keep up the store of life force. That’s clear, and the chances
are that when a man or a woman find out they’re not well placed, the
only way to possibly improve, is to go back to the primal energy, and
be projected again in some other form or place, on this earth, or
anywhere else, where conditions are more acceptable. I have seen that
for a long time, and I am permitted now to give it a demonstration.
When I come back I announce it, and I shall be the one man—the one
man” he was shouting vociferously, “the one man who has carried an
experiment outside of this earth, and made a research in the world
beyond the grave.”
His excitement communicated itself to the group, and even the heavy
browed youth and the twitching woman accorded him a serious attention.
“That’s so, that’s so;” reiterated the anaemics, who roused
themselves from a sort of connubial collapse, and standing, sang in
quavering trebles a remnant of some song belonging to their most
convivial days on the earth.
The effort to sing taxed the nerves and the strength of the two
gilded ones, and their raucous wavering tones threw a vulgar
expression into the affair which had won a weird or mournful or
grotesque interest from the other participants. This contribution
made it all wearisomely coarse. Dreadful as its intention was,
somehow it took on to Tom a theatrical imbecility as if he were
looking at the acting of puppets, who were going through some
grewsome mimicry of a bad play. He had hardly thought so, when the
woman with the twitching face arose and spoke in a soft voice just
audible to Tom, for she turned round facing the cage where Tom and
Ned were concealed, and looked at the painted picture behind her.
“You have all known trouble or sadness, but have any of you been told
to die? I have. My father, dead these seven years, came to me last
week, and told me he wanted me. He came with the big eyes I knew
he had, and he came in my sleep, in a dream, and woke me, and as I
woke I saw him standing at the foot of my bed, and he said, ‘Come!
Come! You will be happier. The Other Side is a blissful sleep a long
never-ending joy. Leave the world _any way_, but COME!’” She stepped
forward and moved up the corridor of the amphitheatre into the garden
and sat wearily down, on one of the benches not far from the very
spot where Tom had lost his hat up the illusive almond bush.
Then there was silence, when the sickly old man poked the comely
fat woman and she struggled to her feet, and said: “Vell, I go to
my childer. Dot’s all.” The young couple that Tom watched with a
frightful feeling that here was some mistake, and that he ought to
stop it, were expected to finish this extemporaneous confession and
the others stared at them questioningly.
The man stood up and became instantly dramatic. Tom riveted his
eyes on him, and could scarcely believe his ears. He waved his
arms in gestures, turned around to the company with ease and
self-satisfaction, declaimed, postured, and ran through a cheap
rhodomontade about the emptiness of life, the folly of prolonging
the fight, the ease of dying under the new helps of science, and
the necessity of bringing the world to a standstill by leaving it.
His wife nodded her head with concurrence to all this astonishing
rhapsody. And then while the attendants waited impatiently to begin
the final act of this fantastic drama the egotist recited the Plaint
of the Captive; it was his own title.
The insipid and hollow verses—and Ned whispered to Tom that they
were taken out of a circular printed by the management of the
Suicidarium—were no sooner over, than the attendants rushed in,
seized the table, and removed it, preparatory to the final stage
of the sinister business. The occupants of the table walked away,
most of them remaining together in the amphitheatre, the heavy
browed youth and the spirit-visited woman entering the garden above
it alone. Then the lamps paled, music and singing apparently from
the side, from a concealed organ began to softly sweep through the
dimming spot, and as Ned nudged Tom in their eerie he muttered, “Pull
that window, seal it up, the gas comes now,” and disappeared.
Despite the horror of his feelings Tom moved even closer to the
little pane peering through to see more plainly. Suddenly the glass
fronted stage glowed, and then grew startlingly bright with a purple
radiance, and Tom discerned a shifting slowly emerging swarm of
ballet girls, with gauzy wings oscillating and hovering from top
to bottom of the scene. Among them, he felt quite certain, were a
number of dolls or puppets worked in some way into a semblance of
soaring angels. The picture made, with the lights thrown upon it, a
curious illusion. The motion soft, sinuous, and constant, blended
with the music as, in a way, its material or physical embodiment.
The swaying bodies, the winding lines, the ordered movements forward
and back, the clustering wings, brought into juxtaposition in
shimmering canopies, the dissolving figures, sudden crushes to the
front of the stage, and then precipitate flights in retreat, single
graceful forms gliding in and out, all through the set phrases of a
formal evolution yielded an ocular impression, that harmonized with
the swelling and pulsating melodies and harmonies. This, _as the
exhilarating gas began to fill the garden_, acted as a delicate and
irresistible narcotic, bringing on the drowsy sleep, the haunted
sense of coming bliss, the wild delirious, forecasts of eventful
happenings, a delectation and revelry of dreams.
Tom watched intently. He could see the people moving, jumping to
their feet, extending their arms, then relaxing and apparently
falling down; he thought he heard cries and songs, certainly he saw
the heavy browed young man, skipping absurdly along one of the gravel
paths, while the woman near him flung her arms about in a strange
excitement, and then rolled off, as if lifeless, in the little brook,
whose petty current was dammed thereby, and the water, rising, flowed
over the pasteboard scene, and trickled away to the amphitheatre.
Tom’s eyes were not the only ones that observed this accident, for
the water soon ceased to run, its very prosaic source in a croton
pipe being at some unseen point intercepted.
The others on the amphitheatre were not all so easily observed,
but it developed that the scientist—he who went to prove his
commission—and the philosopher—he who went to “_See_”—had embraced
each other and fallen, while the sickly old man sat in the comely
German woman’s lap, and the young couple had remained seated and in
each other’s arms. The lights faded, the gas rushed in with such
overpowering force that it penetrated the secret cell where Tom
stood, and the last flickering pulses of life in the suicides were
brought to a standstill, and the awful act was closed.
Ned told Tom that the gas would remain in the garden for an hour or
so more. Then the fans were turned on for the rest of the night, so
as to thoroughly ventilate the place. Towards morning the bodies were
taken away, across the creek, and there delivered to friends—if such
had been designated—or cremated or buried according to the direction
received beforehand by the suicidarium.
Tom and Ned got back to the upper earth by means of a ladder
stretched upward through a narrow shaft. They emerged not far from
the Kingsbridge road, and the first flutter of the balmy June air
upon their cheeks, the fresh floating odors of the flowers wafted
from the gardens of Carrara, the paling stars seen vaguely through
that polarized and mystic light that shone from the city, the glad
couples laughing with the gayety of the life that surged through all
things, the glowing lamps on the shaded slopes of Fort George, the
occasional sliding noiseless splendor of an illuminated automobile—at
that remote period the automobile becomes a spectacle of garlanded
electric lights—with the terraced mansions beyond the river on the
east, the smell of the earth, the swishing rattle of the subway
trains over their viaduct, all the many moods and signs of glorious
vitality, of aspiring and incessant joy, made Tom’s heart leap with
thankfulness.
The remembrance of the hidden hollow pageant he had just witnessed,
the distorted mental emotionalism and effrontery of its victims,
their gluttony, their last convulsions, and the sombre misery of the
picture of the dead bodies, distributed over the pink garden, and
along the gray benches of the white amphitheatre, in that recess of
abominations, nauseated him. He felt a secret distrust and repulsion
for his companion; he was silent, and while Ned, with eager garrulity
attempted to allay and avert what he felt was a rising antipathy, Tom
seemed sullen and brooding, hurrying on with ravenous strides, as if
running from a pestilence.
He did indeed hear Ned’s communications, and they were startling
enough to his corporeal vision yet hunting for the blossoms of
existence, and fully satisfied with the radiant panorama around
him. Ned told him of the growing apathy of men to the duties and
burdens of life, the rapid spread of a relentless scorn for
the promises of religion, and the propaganda of a remorseless
flouting cynicism for the realities of society. He made it very
clear that the impulses to suicide were increasing, and that over
the city the concealed establishments such as Tom had seen were
spreading; that it was commonly believed that the escape from
pain, sickness, poverty—although in such cases as they had just
witnessed the expenses were heavy—was legitimately sought in a
violent death; that the marvellous properties of the gas used
in these suicidariums—conveying to those inhaling it a sensuous
delirium, accompanied, it was said, by an exaltation strange and
transporting—had made suicide even a desirable indulgence. Things had
gone so far as that the difficulties of the labor markets had been
viewed as offering to labor the advantageous opportunity of settling
them by wholesale withdrawals, or at least a selected and progressive
system of immolation, by which the supply of workers might be kept
exactly regulated to their demand, so that good or extreme wages
might always be paid.
Tom listened to these revelations with an appalled attention,
though he still kept his mouth shut, and still covered the ground
with violent and angry steps. They had turned from the Kingsbridge
road eastward over Dyckman Street, and had ascended the Fort George
Hill, whence the whole expanse of Carrara was seen palpitating in
the velvet night with a dreamy phosphorescence, that hung over it
like an arching tapestry pendent from the electrified air above it.
Tom turned back and gazed at it with renewed wonder. It seemed so
incredible. He turned to Ned and spoke for the first time. “Where
does the electricity come from that fills that air?”
Ned scarcely moved his head to notice the marvellous glory of it, and
answered, “That comes from the pits in the earth.”
“Pits?” ejaculated Tom. “Yes, pits,” retorted his pleased companion,
“pits bored down in the earth for thousands of feet They draw on the
storage batteries of the earth for that, as I understand it. But I
can’t explain it to you.”
Tom rumimated for a time. He ran back over those memories of his
which were associated with the reading of the wonders of the wizards
of the past—Edison, Marconi, Tesla, Ramsay, Lord Kelvin, Perkins—and
later names, whose achievements had so often led him on to the
small hours of the night, reading in his little room at home, the
books, magazines, and papers, that came to his hand, and which had
contributed to make him so zestful to reach the outer world of
designs and marvels. There was silence between the two men while
their footsteps rang out on the pavements, and they approached the
dazzling arch of the Washington Bridge. Instinctively they turned
by one impulse, to the left and walked out upon the steel span from
which the city beyond and below them, and the defile of the Harlem
river, formed together a magical and almost bewildering picture.
They leaned over the railing at the side, and then Tom spoke:
“Perhaps it’s this way, I mean those pits. There is electricity
in the earth, great currents of it, and lesser streams, and it
disappears by becoming neutralized with itself, as it were. Now if
insulated wires or rods could be sunk for great depths, and these
rods and wires spread out in the earth in finer threads, these fine
threads would pick up a good many small unneutralized currents of
electricity, and they would run together like little streams of
water, and they would rise on the insulated rods just as accumulating
water rises in a hole or well, when it runs in it. That was done with
the electricity of the air. The currents run up to the receivers, and
when these are over-charged, they play out in the air. It seems queer
that nobody is hurt, or that there are not lightning flashes instead
of the quiet glow!”
Ravishingly strange was the scene before them from the bridge. The
walls of the Harlem River cañon were surmounted with lofty houses,
the edge of the stream was defined with an unbroken path of light,
the houses shone with interior lamps, the streets around them were
ablaze, and the nebulous crown of light added its ghostly glare. The
shadows were intense, and the picture was not unlike some deeply
bitten etching, with monstrous opacities in it, skillfully curtained
in high lights, that lent it an unearthly exaggeration.
The two young men stopped a long time, buried each in his own
thoughts, which with Ned had probably slight reference to lofty
feelings, but which with Tom, by the indefinable but very real
repulsion he experienced for the part he had played at the
suicidarium, moved pleasantly forward into deeper hopes for his
coming life and sterner resolves to make it worth living.
Finally Ned spoke: “Well, it’s getting late and perhaps we’d both be
the better for a good sleep.”
“True enough,” answered Tom, “I’m ready,” and they crossed to the
subway on Amsterdam Avenue as to-day, and quickly found themselves
at the resplendent porticoes of the Pillar of Light. Tom hastened to
his delightful little eerie, and found a letter pushed under his door
sill. He tore it open and a card dropped out. It read:
BENTON BRIGGS
Secretary to the Mayor, City Hall.
(and scribbled along the bottom) “Come to the Mayor’s Office
to-morrow at 11 A.M.” Tom felt in his bones that it meant occupation
for him, and his heart leaped with thankfulness. He would deserve it,
indeed he would, and so he fell asleep.
CHAPTER V
THE MAYOR
The Mayor’s office had been temporarily removed to the Governor’s
room in the City Hall. The lately elected incumbent of the mayorality
was seated there, looking out of the window which commanded the view
of a restored park area. From this window a fountain spouting its
silver drops high in the air could be seen, reviving, with a leap
backward of over a century and a half, memories of Old New York, as
it was known to pedestrians passing the City Hall Park in 1850. The
colossal ugliness of the present post office had been removed, and
the curving tip of the park, green and shaded and wet with drifting
spray from the resurrected fountain pushed its verdant tongue into
the human currents, moving in black throngs along Broadway and Park
Place.
And from these currents occasional individuals dropped out, halted,
entered the park, and caught the fresh sky over this tiny interval
in the clustering cliffs of titanic towers around it. The sky often
seemed like a vivid sapphire jewel set between alabaster walls.
Everywhere else the soaring babels rose, largely built of marble,
shadowing the crevices below them where the compressed tides of
business swept and surged almost noiselessly, but intense and
continuous.
The Mayor turned from the pleasant picture which lay so completely
framed within the limits of the window as to form a unique episode of
green trees, flowering beds, the lounging inhabitants of the park,
the bristling fountain, bathed in sunshine, and beyond the still and
solemn and peaceful walls of Old St. Paul’s Church. He turned to
his secretary, standing at the side of the table, with some loose
sheets of paper thickly covered with writing, and who seemed to be
studying his superior with an interest that could only be detected in
his eyes, and in the posture of his head, for his body was slightly
turned aside, almost as if he had been stopped in the act of walking
away.
“Yes,” the voice had a singular clearness, the articulation of
the syllables seemed almost strained, “it is a revolt; it is
insurrection. The law is paramount; Sulla repressed the democratic
revolution in Rome. And it was necessary. A state must survive.
And yet the state is nothing but its members. A state has no
generalized expression. It means nothing but a group of people trying
to harmonize their ideas into a government, with some hereditary
conventions of plans and laws handed down to them as valuable
safeguards of society. But experience counts, and experience proves
one thing; clearly that chaos, even a chaos that breaks chains and
turns slaves free, is practically a worse condition than Order, even
if order means tyranny.”
“But, Sir,” it was the voice of the man who met Tom Ratler in Battery
Park, “these unbridled excesses cannot be permitted to go unpunished.
There is no tyranny in repressing murder, in putting behind lock
and key unruly and desperate men, who set no bounds to their savage
and incendiary lusts, who would overturn our order and make living
impossible. You cannot have sympathy with the growling curs of the
street, even if they are hungry when you know their fangs may bring
disease and death to the best man that happens to walk past them.”
“All right, Briggs,” it was the first voice, and it was the Mayor’s,
accompanied with laughter, “have no fear, that I intend to play
Cataline or degrade our city by any subserviency to riot and rioters.
No! I will meet your expectations on that score fast enough. I will
remit nothing. The law takes its course. And yet—” he looked up with
a surprisingly youthful countenance into the staring and disturbed
face of his secretary; “these poor fellows are misled. They are a sad
hearted lot, and life is a stern and empty ordeal, bringing them
nothing that you and I call life. And I can see how they get enraged
and reckless. What do you make out of a society which lives in the
light, the gayest brightest sunlight, at the top, and is held up to
that sunlight, by those who never see it; who stand on a pedestal
so high that all the world seems theirs, or at least is seen by
them, and that pedestal is the thronged column of human crowds who
bend their backs, one over the other, immovable in the rigidity of
patience, resignation, deprivation, so that the little groups at the
top may feel no motion beneath their feet, and may keep their eyes
fixed upon the stars, or for that matter,” the voice sank a note or
two, “upon themselves, unmolested by any terror beneath them, not
even concerned as to why and how they keep their place at all?”
“But, Sir,” the secretary laid the papers he carried down on the
Mayor’s desk, he leaned with both hands upon it, and his voice
betrayed his impatience; “pardon me, but I take exception to your
image. We often deceive ourselves by a false metaphor, and act
wrongly, at least in thought, by illusions rising like mirages
from a foolish prepossession. Your image is not exact, certainly
not in this country. Society is not a pillar with a few disengaged
hands at the top, and all the way down to the ground underneath
them a hunger-driven, duty-compressed mass. Society is a variously
arranged surface, hill and vale, wilderness and cultivated land.
People are where they find themselves in one or the other for many
reasons—inheritance, accident, self-will, stubbornness, imprudence,
stupidity—but they can move sideways, or in any way. They can fill
up the valley, drain the swamp, cut down the wilderness. If they
start fires and burn out the civilization, the culture, the comfort
they envy, will they not only make a devastation more terrible than
their previous destitution? Do you recommend plunder, as a remedy for
poverty? Do you believe rapine, arson, murder, are the educational
means for the elevation of the poor or the ignorant or the vicious? I
know well enough Sir, you do not, and you should not raise a finger
to help these culprits, convicted by every honest man’s conscience.”
The Mayor’s expression was a study. There could be no doubt that he
admired his secretary, but a reserve crept into his eyes, that seemed
to say—“very well, very well, my fine Sir, but perhaps if you were
looking at the matter from the other end of the social field glass
some infirmities of temper that now loom, under the circumstances, to
you, as very large, might appear very small;” still he made no motion
of vexation. He listened, and when Mr. Briggs stopped, he simply
said, leaning back in his chair, and folding his arms; “What were all
the circumstances exactly?”
The secretary moved to a map of the city that was laid upon a table,
and which he raised in his hands pointing to the spots, which
illustrated his narrative, as he referred to them.
“It began in Grand Street, in that den and sink of infamy, the office
of The Beehive. The whole plot was hatched there. The paper should be
suppressed. Longtinsky has made himself an enemy of decency. He is
a Jacobite; an anarchist, a ruthless demon, who recognizes no rule,
but the same bloody and murderous acts that he thinks can be used to
stifle industry.
“The first known about the fire was the flames shooting from the
stairway of Helen Lorimer’s Settlement Hall on Pitt Street. A dozen
men started out from the basement, and six of them were nabbed; among
them Polinck, Longtinsky’s right hand man. He had paper and matches
in his pocket and a smell of oil and smoke was in his clothes.
The wind was blowing and before the firemen reached the place the
building was seething with flames. Then came an explosion. It was
that which killed the people in the streets. There was a stampede,
and again another explosion sent burning timbers over the streets and
started two other fires. Almost a block was destroyed and there were
ten deaths. Let these men alone, let them stay here, and they will
send their accomplices over the city: they will make outbreaks at a
dozen points; and they will make us a laughing stock to the whole
world. Immunity will encourage them to believe that they are feared.
They will breed a pestilence of disorder that nothing can quell. The
electric chair for each of them is mercy.”
Mr. Briggs had, long before this climax, dropped the map, and again
stood at the side of the Mayor’s desk. The latter arose, and as
he stood there he measured fully the height of his secretary; but
he was thin, with a remarkably well shaped and evenly balanced
body, and his face, without a distinct claim to beauty, possessed
a singular interest, from its expression, its paleness and a
winning look, of grace and sympathy in the full blue eyes. His
brow was rather too high for the finest facial effectiveness, but
this was in a measure corrected by the chestnut hair which richly
covered his head and floated downward over the brow; his hands were
noticeably long fingered, his mouth wide and too narrow, the ears
bent backward to the skull and the nose straight, handsomely formed,
but not intellectual. His eyes caught the eye of an observer and
held them. They were unaffectedly delightful to see. Many things
looked out from them, and not the least inviting was candor and
affection whilst in other moods they expressed a keen enjoyment of
fun and no inconsiderable delight in living. And then again they
became introspective and sad and perhaps their beauty was thus most
conspicuous. The face certainly did not produce an impression of
force or great mental acumen, but it was a face that men would trust
and women might love.
If the attraction it exerted might be safely referred to any
one physical feature, it could be ascribed to the delicately
pencilled eyebrows, which possessed a coloring slightly more
accentuated—deeper—than his hair, and which gave his face an artistic
form, the suggestion of aesthetics, or literary or even poetic
aptitude.
The Mayor had placed his hand on the shoulder of his secretary; “My
friend you are too severe, but you are right as to the theory at
least of my conduct in this case. There will be no suspense of the
judgment, and the men must die. Ah! how hard it is to say that word,”
and the man, who had evidently gone through a storm of conflicting
feelings sighed, and again turned with grave eyes to the picture seen
through the window at his side. At that moment the shivering arrest
of an automobile drew the attention of both men to the outside,
and it was Briggs who announced, with a breath of vexation in his
voice; “Your Honor will now have the supreme pleasure of meeting the
superb Helen Lorimer. She approaches with all her charms. If I am
not greatly mistaken she comes to plead the cause of these condemned
criminals. She has suffered herself in property and in personal
abuse, but she belongs to the ‘progressives,’ she belongs to those
who think that ‘the quality of mercy is not strained.’ She has an
incurable fund of optimism, and some of her aphorisms sound better
than they work. May I earnestly,” he had stepped close to the Mayor,
and his demeanor showed his extreme anxiety, “beg your Honor not to
be too susceptible to her eloquence.”
“You stay here,” replied the Mayor, smiling, “with such a Cerberus
of denial and refutation though she brought Apollo’s lute I should
be safe. Besides I feel some timidity about entertaining so great a
woman. From all accounts she is the Hypatia of our Alexandrian New
York.”
The page at the door approached, and handed the Mayor a card. It bore
the name Helen Lorimer. The Mayor moved to the door and disappeared.
In the next instant he returned, preceded by the woman we have
already seen, and who met the apprehensive greeting of Mr. Briggs
with a cordial and reassuring friendliness.
The Mayor occupied temporarily the great room, formerly called the
Governor’s Room, during the period when the city of New York was part
of the State of that name. The sacred relic of the Revolutionary
days—Washington’s Desk—was opposite his own at the west end of the
apartment, and he sat facing the heroic portrait of Washington above
the mantel on the west wall; behind him still remained the portrait
of George Clinton, to his right hand those of Governors Tompkins
and Lewis, and on his left through the unchanged green lambrequins
he saw the extended park. The fine distinction of the room, with
its east and west chambers as well, the delicate repression and
formal simplicity in its ornament, delighted him. Often in his few
unoccupied moments he would review the storied walls, standing long
before the painting of Hamilton and Jay, lost in reveries over the
splendid past, recalling the daring skill, the patriotic fervor,
the almost prophetic insight of the great Jamaican. He felt the
spur of the renowned example, and in his heart—hardly known to
himself—stirred the promptings of a magnanimous envy.
Helen Lorimer entered the room, and her brilliancy gave to the sedate
place a moderate radiance, which somehow startled both the Mayor and
his secretary. Her beauty was more revealed than usual, from the
freshness of color in her cheeks, and the animation and interest
in her eyes, while a considerable grace in her approach united
with simplicity of dress, made her charming as a mere object of
inspection. The knowledge both these men possessed of her qualities
of mind and heart evoked in their faces—and for different reasons—a
visible response of excitement.
The Mayor received his visitor with admirable ease, though a faint
tide of color flushing his pale countenance betrayed an interior
emotion which did not escape the observation of Mr. Briggs, who
subjected the new comer to a scrutiny which suggested his personal
reluctance to leave his superior officer alone with her. Mr. Briggs
felt too surely the vacillating attitude of his chief, in the affairs
of state then pressing for solution to look with complacency upon any
influence less uncompromising and severe than his own.
Helen Lorimer extended her hand, which was grasped by the younger
man. She looked at the mayor for a moment quite steadily and to his
secretary with a noticeable repression of the first smile of friendly
salutation. The Mayor motioned her to a chair conveniently placed at
the front of his desk, and, as she sat down, was the first to speak,
“I appreciate the honor of your visit, Miss Lorimer, and I beg to
make you acquainted with my secretary Mr. Briggs.”
Mr. Briggs bowed a little stiffly, and evidently convinced that his
presence was essential, or at least, up to this point, not explicitly
discouraged, took a chair somewhat near the side-table carrying the
maps he had been examining. The Mayor returned behind his desk, but
remained still standing, his gaze fixed with expectancy upon Miss
Lorimer, who for a moment turned her eyes to the floor, and then,
raising them towards the Mayor, with a resumption of her graciousness
and her inviting confidence disclosed her mission.
“I presume I should avoid all mere feminine circumlocution and be
very prompt and business-like, Mr. Mayor, in telling you the purpose
of my visit. It is about the men who have been so quickly convicted
of manslaughter, in the affair of the fire and explosion in Pitt
Street which destroyed my Settlement Hall. This condemnation to death
seems to me harsh, unnecessary, perhaps I should say cruel, and I
believe that vindictiveness in this case will breed still greater
mischief.”
Mr. Briggs was now decidedly aroused. He turned his eyes upon the
lady with the faintest intimation of scorn, and seemed almost
unable to repress his desire to speak. But it was the Mayor who
answered——and the peculiar clearness of enunciation and the substance
of his words as well, evidently impressed his hearer. She leaned
towards his desk and looking upward watched him with an eagerness
which might have been readily mistaken for personal admiration of
the speaker. With alert minds such as hers sympathetic response
involves interior subjective harmonies that may be felt, but are not
at first understood. Something very personal shone in her eyes, and
whether it was art or reason or taste, or goodness in what he said or
how he said it, Helen Lorimer perceived, or better, felt, the element
of nobility in the young governor of the City of New York before her.
Nor was Mr. Briggs less impressed. He congratulated himself upon
the result of his assiduous tuition; at least he put it that way to
himself.
“No! Miss Lorimer there can be no review of that decision. You are
moved by an admirable compassion. But you have for once at least
forgotten to yield to your better judgment. These men were atrocious
criminals. The fact that they have been condemned to death makes
them no less so. Punishment is the defense of order. There is no
other. Moral suasion has its precautionary value in their case, death
or imprisonment removes the agent and the disease. It is a kind of
segregation that stops infection. I do not wish to appear cynical,
but government on this earth will never escape the requirements of
the penal code. The hearts of governors may bleed—mine does—but
rulers must act outside of the indulgent motives of sentiment, and
have a fixed and even stern eye for the interests of order. The
constitution of states may be irreparable blunders: those chosen to
execute their commands cannot permit themselves to criticise their
operation. This is not tyranny or a stupid conformity, or simply an
irrational servility. It is duty.
“Are you invoking a higher ministration? Do you believe that your
pity or the State’s commiseration and forgiveness will change these
men? Convince yourself that they desire an overthrow of our present
social relations that that desire is, with them, conviction, and
if you believe in the existing order, what possible alternative of
action can you recommend, referable to that order’s continuance, but
their suppression?”
“Ah! Yes! your Honor I know all this is appealingly clear—in a
way—but is the evidence so clear against the men themselves? And
should the State be vengeful? Does not hatred breed hatred and are
not the victories of Mercy more secure, more enduring?”
Helen Lorimer leaned forward on the Mayor’s desk and her face
startled the young executive by its beauty, its beauty of form and of
expression, and he sank into his chair, impatiently warring within
himself with a strange willingness to surrender to any petition which
came in so lovely a guise. Had he been repeating stock phrases?
Could anything so tenderly so ravishingly beautiful as this woman
be resisted? Was she not more? Her voice was a penetrating music
that delighted him. And of praise of her mind was not the City full?
He felt a hopeless inability to repel an approach so enthralling.
His words had been stately enough, his voice in its best form,—but
somehow he felt it was a mask, and his heart, his live heart—not
the executive organ encrusted with traditions—rejected his own
words, and craved the very thing his fair visitor intimated. Still
there was a regnant sense left in him of position, of authority, of
responsibility. He remembered Briggs. He cast a fugitive glance at
his secretary, who had drawn closer to him, indeed stood directly at
his side, as if he understood his ordeal, and would invigorate his
strength, with his own uncompromising hostility to any temporising
with the ends of justice.
Again the young Mayor spoke, and no trace of indecision, not even the
respectful condescension of courtesy sounded in his voice which would
have carried, to the critical ear, a note a little too severe, as if
uttered under the constraint of a misgiving which, for appearance’s
sake, gave it harshness.
“Pity is a tender virtue in woman, Miss Lorimer. It has its
beneficent uses but it can enter too carelessly into the
considerations of policy which determine the existence of society.
The State, in which are gathered for safety thousands—in our
community millions—of souls, becomes inviolate, as an entity, the
moment they engage to live together for mutual security and progress.
“These men would take your pity at a value which degrades it. They
would consider it fear. And they would only rage more ferociously
against the social state. They are frankly anarchists, they assert
the solidarity of chaos, the unity of discord, the prosperity of
idleness, the stability of disorder. Their philosophy is a jumble
of contradictions. But worse, they are self-elected criminals, or
else they are hopelessly mad. They are your personal enemies, Miss
Lorimer. Their detestable organ incites the vicious to mischief
against yourself.
“I should be recreant to my own oath of office, and I should insult
the public intelligence if I changed the sentence of these men. Have
you any proof that the sentiment of this city asks for commutation.
I have heard something of a petition in their favor, but I have not
yet seen it. Miss Lorimer I cannot consider for one instant your
intercession. The quickness and rigor of the sentence upon these men
is no slight testimony to both the enormity of their crime, and the
sureness of their guilt.”
“Mr. Mayor,” again the appealing voice, the eloquent motion of
importunity as Helen Lorimer moved her hand almost supplicatingly
towards the speaker, and above all the flushed beautiful face,
“You must know I have no reason to find fault with your position.
You are held rather tightly I know within the limitations of your
oath of office. But is it quite certain that these men—I mean the
very men condemned—were guilty? Are you quite sure they are such
red-throated curse-breathing, death-dealing fiends as the papers
paint them and the preachers say? Are the mass meetings of the smug
and self satisfied and well-to-do oracles of wisdom or sense or
even moderation? Let us be very candid indeed. But let us also be
careful about our self-respect. Are you willing to send these men to
death, convicted as they have been in a two days’ trial not on the
evidence, which the State admitted was open to doubt, but convicted
by the feverish hostility of a populace, frightened out of its wits?
“Can you forget the devastation that is wrought in the moral sense of
a community when it gratifies the gluttony of its rage over those who
have half scared it to death? These men were not murderers at heart.
They were victims of their own credulity, tools, swinish tools let us
say, of cleverer and deeper brains. Kill them, Mr. Mayor, and those
cleverer and deeper brains will have new formulas to repeat and in
the repetition they will win a perilous plausibility that will give
socialism a martyr’s crown, not the ignominy of a felon’s grave.”
“But,” the young Mayor had also stretched out his hand and held it
for an instant rested upon the back of the gloved fingers of Helen
Lorimer, “do you forget the innocent who have suffered, those who
have actually been killed, those who have been wounded? Are we coolly
to recommend patience to them, while they sit unsatisfied and bitter
about the graves of their dead? Are you quite sure that neglect here
might not start a reactionary outcry, against the heartlessness of
Society, against its laxity, its inefficiency? Are you willing to
place us between two fires, the torch of an incendiary anarchy, and
the bullets of a Vigilance Committee?”
“I forget nothing, your Honor:” Miss Lorimer arose, and, as if to a
gesture of command, the Mayor also arose, “I have seen the families
of all the wounded, of all the dead. They need nothing, and their
mouths are not filled with threats of vengeance; they speak of the
timeliness of clemency. They actually fear the anger of society, as
that it may blindly outrage the groveling thousands who will see
in it a Juggernaut of selfish fear, not the sword of Justice. They
live among these classes and they know. Neither are they convinced
that this hunger for punishment is in their behalf. It is the self
preservative spasm of respectability.”
Again the Mayor glanced at Mr. Briggs as if he faltered in his
thoughts, but a sudden surge of blood mantled in his cheeks. Even to
Helen Lorimer he became handsome, and it was this strange new beauty,
in a man, that brought for an instant, the color in her own face, and
challenged her heart with a question of incredulity.
“Odd, Miss Lorimer,” he said, “that I should place myself in
opposition to yourself as the guardian of your own class. I can
understand your feelings, their magnanimity; indeed I see more than
that. Your purpose might be termed an esoteric patriotism.
“Apparently condoning a wrong, apparently forgiving an outrage
you intend to turn into legitimate channels the angry tides of
unrest which you think mount higher and more dangerously as they
were resisted or overborne. You mean to win back to allegiance by
kindnesses the unruly spirits that may grow, as you think, more
turbulent by repression. I understand, of course, but is it wise?”
The Mayor’s question was addressed to two listeners, for, as he asked
it, he turned half away from the absorbed, lovely figure before
him—more beautiful than ever—to his inward sense for the nobility of
the soul that dwelt in it—to his rigid and observant secretary.
The invitation to speak was accepted, almost precipitately by that
individual, who directed every word to the person of Miss Lorimer.
He seemed to have forgotten his superior, although his first word
answered the latter’s query.
“It is not wise; it is not sane; it is frivolous and it is cruel.
Cruel because it will lead to greater disasters, to more loss of
life and property. I know these people too, the men who read, who
believe the creed of The Beehive. They are maniacs of unrest. They
are demented with illusions; the distortion of their minds distorts
their feelings, and they are social outlaws. They have become
ravenous with impious hopes. In them the jackal and the hyena are
united; the lust of their hearts is murder and rapine, though they
do not always care to put their own hands to the job. They have
ambition. It is formless, inconsiderate, of colossal selfishness and
preposterous egotism. But they are without true courage. The leaders
at heart are a pack of besotted braggadocios, empty of all daring,
furiously vindictive, meanly cunning, and skulkers behind the bodies
of braver, more robust men. They can be terrified into inaction. They
can be prostrated by one overwhelming act of condign punishment.
They will shrink into nothingness before the retribution of summary
annihilation. The paralysis of terror will kill their will and their
energies and they will vanish.
“Parley with them and they will devour you, for they are as ruthless
as wolves, and, judging others by their own degraded instincts, the
first intimation from your lips of clemency will form a new incentive
for their insulting malice to propose more preposterous concessions.
They are a class engendered by vicious exaggerations of the ills
of society. They were originally formed in the prison houses, the
miasmatic swamps, the pest houses of European tyrannies. They exult
in the supremacy of their shameless dreams. If there are exaltations
of speech or even of ideas among them, they are baseless lunacies
built up on tricky words and on ignorance of their supine victims.
No, Sir,” turning to the Mayor, “Society as we understand it is
incompatible with these people, except as under the coercion of fear
they remain inert and helpless.”
The Mayor had not taken his eyes from the face of Helen Lorimer,
and the gleam of a flitting smile crossed his lips as he noted the
concentrated attention she gave his secretary. But her attention
changed visibly to anger. The liquid depth of her eyes grew firm
with a light of repudiation and denial; her lips straightened just a
little with disdain and impatience her posture was more erect as if
courting the blow that seemed aimed at her mistaken benevolence, and
then all this changed again, into a sad look which gave her—in the
Mayor’s mind—an even loftier loveliness as of a seraph mourning over
some carnal contumacy that he could not help or bless.
That quickly passed, and Miss Lorimer gave at last a wondering glance
at the Mayor, as Mr. Briggs concluded his fiery exhortation, and then
withdrew a little, almost as if meditating an abrupt exit. But she,
in this way, put herself just perceptibly in opposition, she secured
a physical separation which adroitly emphasized her complete dissent.
Both the anger and the momentary graveness had left her face. She was
smiling. It was a smile of deprecation, an unspoken reproach in which
pity dwelt. She spoke with a hurried earnestness that betrayed her
suspense.
“You wrong these people, Sir, indeed you do. I have not been slow to
learn a great deal about them from their own lips. I have not busied
myself solely in a lecturing propaganda. I have indeed striven to
make less hostile their resentment against the rich, to overcome
their ingrained sense of separation and repudiation, but I have also
been a listener and a pupil. I know some of the very men condemned.
It is not possible that they are murderers at heart. Their families
have fallen at my feet in weeping agonies of protest that they were
misled, whipped into a blind rage by artifice, by drink, by bribes,
by threats. If you thrust these men into Eternity you are doing a
bitterly cruel thing and making a grave mistake. I ask you, Sir,”
she came forward and addressed the Mayor, “only the slight favor of
a delay—let it be that—let me present new evidence to the courts
to show that these men—some of them—are the victims of perjury,
that they were absolutely free of guilt—that the bombs were put in
the building by other hands—miscreants who fled and left them—and
then forced or persuaded these unfortunates to enter the building.
I have a curious suspicion that my own class are not innocent in a
big plot—favored, for money by the creatures of The Beehive—to bring
about an ignominious triumph over the enemies of their order. There
is something to be learned on that score.
“You speak of Society and its indignation. I too run risks and
encounter forfeits. But an injustice will more grievously wreck
your career than the transient rage of ignorance. Prove rather the
greatness of your office by defending these speechless victims of a
popular fury. More, Sir, I will accept the challenge of the people, I
will establish their innocence by proof—the innocence of some. It can
be done. My lawyers have been successful in gathering fresh evidence
at many points. I can prove perjury. There have been paid witnesses
commissioned to destroy these lives. If the State trembles at the
thought of an assault upon its life, how much more deeply it will
grieve, if, in its own defense, it has struck down innocent men. What
will it say to the assassins of its honor? Be at least rational. It
is common talk; the precipitate action of the State; the apparently
prejudiced and frightened decision of the judge; the hasty verdict.
Shall the blot of an equivocal judgment send six men to death, five
of whom I believe can be proven innocent, and can either a State or
an individual survive such a miscarriage of justice? Listen to me,
Sir:” the Mayor was indeed listening, he hung upon her words, he had
pushed past his secretary, he bent himself forward, keenly searching
the beautiful face before him, which itself by some prompting had
come closer and closer to his own, and which, in the hurrying current
of words made its very breath fan the parted lips of the young
governor.
The Mayor spoke. Mr. Briggs would have stopped him, he even touched
his arm in an admonition more strenuous than respectful—but the Mayor
paid no attention; he shook his arm free of the detention, his voice
rose somewhat, and he held out his hand to Miss Lorimer who took
it, and even pressed her disengaged hand upon it, and thus in the
chancery of the touch of a woman, who made his heart beat strangely,
the Mayor forget the rhetoric of his office and spake frankly.
“You _shall_ be heard, Miss Lorimer, you _shall_ have the reprieve.
Let me see your evidence, let the courts see it. Time and place
shall be allotted to you to put this all in order; but why have you
withheld it, why urge abstraction when you had the concrete facts to
support your claim. God forbid that this State or I, shall commit
judicial murder. An order goes from this office now, and by the hands
of my secretary,” he turned with a slight almost indifferent gesture
towards Mr. Briggs, who stood flushed and angry behind him, “to delay
the execution, and, on the showing of new evidence and the suspected
treachery of witnesses, to recommend the re-trial of the whole
matter.”
Miss Lorimer withdrew her hands and said; “It may seem to you
peculiar that I did not come to the point of the new proof I have,
to establish the innocence of some of these men, at the outset. But,
Sir, I did indeed wish to withhold it at this moment, unless less
convincing arguments failed. And they did. You may have been right in
forcing my hand; I do not regret it, except that, so much known it
may too quickly reach the ears of the prosecutors, and help them to
overcome or avoid it. I hope, Sir, that this confession, may, for the
present, be considered sacred. From the bottom of my heart I thank
you. You will have no regrets.”
She bowed and, extending her hand again, shook heartily the Mayor’s;
she stepped past him, and advanced to the recalcitrant Briggs. That
non-plussed and utterly disgusted person was not to be outdone,
and he received the lady’s proffered advance with a discretion and
civility that was entirely courteous but also significantly formal.
The Mayor passed out of the room with Miss Lorimer, and, as they
moved down the serpentine stairway of the rotunda, he told her that
the reprieve would be officially published, the lawyers she retained
should then apply for a new trial to the courts, and that she would
personally grant him a favor, essential for his own defence, if she
would permit him to know more definitely the nature and the details
of her action and case.
Miss Lorimer assented to everything gladly, was profuse in her
thanks, and, as they descended the outside steps of the City Hall,
intimated the honor and the enjoyment it would give herself, her
mother, and her uncle to have the distinction of a visit from his
Honor. Almost exultantly the Mayor accepted this invitation—he felt
within himself nothing had ever seemed so desirable, so inviting, so
valued—and only a little hesitatingly stipulated that she would allow
him to make the appointment. And that favor was politely granted.
Miss Lorimer entered her motor car and the Mayor watched her depart,
and was himself invested with other watchers, attracted to the spot
by so unusual occurrence; but among the many eyes rivetted upon the
distinguished couple, two only, from the room they had both but an
instant vacated, bestowed upon them an inspection, a hard reflective
scrutiny, that meant neither satisfaction nor approval.
As the Mayor returned up the steps of the Hall he passed a young man
whose fine proportions and handsome face, at the very moment when
another face filled his thoughts with a singular tenacity, caught his
eye and extorted from him an involuntary notice of admiration. It was
our young friend Tom Ratler. Mr. Briggs had also seen him from the
Governor’s room, and was moved to an ejaculation thereby, that opened
his lips, but was not embodied in any articulate sounds.
Tom felt that he was following the Mayor, and he turned backwards
a few steps to delay his entrance in the Hall from a modest and
becoming sense of the propriety of respect. He looked at the
disappearing automobile with its precious freight of beauty, and a
pleasant smile—that smile that always accompanies the subjective
sense in any one of having discovered a love affair—lit up his face,
and it was with its lingering grace still in his young eyes, that he
entered the Mayor’s office.
Mr. Briggs had expected him, and left the room as the Mayor returned
by another door; he met Tom and ushered him in. He was introduced
to the Mayor as the “young man Mr. Briggs had suggested for his
chauffeur, and whom his Honor may have remembered he (Mr. Briggs) had
told him of, as having defended himself with so much spirit at the
Battery Park.”
The Mayor was delighted. He very soon satisfied himself that Tom
understood the nature of the avocation he intended him for, engaged
him, and sent him to his home, in one of the most charming sections
of the city, the revived, renovated, restored area of the Ninth Ward,
in the old precincts of Greenwich Village. Tom was provided with a
letter of endorsement and identification and with an elation that
invigorated him, started for his new place. He left the Mayor and
his secretary standing in the embrasure of a window, and heard their
voices distinctly rising in a discussion that showed—if he was not
greatly mistaken—that both were angry.
The changes of the centuries have their compensations. They seem
to old fashioned folk the more memorable and pleasing when they
accomplish graceful restorations of the past. Such a wonderful thing
had happened in the old section of the city which one hundred or
more years before this happy revival, had formed the Ninth Ward of
New York. It had boasted of the sweetness of its past, but at that
time (1900, or thereabouts) found itself slowly slipping into the
squalor of a miscellaneous and mongrel existence with increasing
tenements, “flats,” and slowly multiplying miseries of dirt and
dilapidation, where once had been (away back in 1850) lovely homes,
thrifty, American, and enticing, shaded with beauty of trees, and
linked with a still more remote and romantic period, when the village
of Greenwich caught the reflected rays of the setting suns from the
broad waters of the Hudson, and its lanes ran down to the water’s
edge.
A marvellous revival had again covered this district, (anywhere from
Canal Street northward to Fourteenth Street and between Broadway and
the Hudson) inserting a finer phrase of expression and feeling than
it had ever known, actually transfigured into a joyful ostentation of
gardened homes and spacious houses, enclosing streets of cleanliness
and all knit together into a texture of deliberate and calculated
comfort. Here was the Mayor’s home.
The movement which brought so pleasantly and improvingly this ancient
reserve of the city into prominence was the creation of a Governor’s
House within the city limits, and the selection of this region, by
the fortunate suggestion of an adroitly reminiscent artist. The
city had taken six houses along the present St. Luke’s Place, just
north of the little renaissance park, and made there—moving some
back from the sidewalk, and taking others away, and adjusting garden
spaces around them—a central house, in white and red, with creamy
white shutters, an iron fence about it all, and a few white mulberry
trees in front. It formed such a pretty picture, and revived so
keenly an old time veneration for the historic site of the ancient
village, that others copied the city’s example, and from point to
point, houses were bought, torn down, or moved, and changed; and
slowly, but with a well sanctioned enthusiasm, the blocks, now so
dull and unresponsive, blossomed and grew warm, with sunny and
shadowed homes. The extent and outlines of this urban restoration,
just mellow enough, just delicate and grave enough, embraced the
spaces from St. Luke’s Place to Christopher Street, with meandering
threads of extension up Greenwich Avenue to Seventh Avenue through
Hudson Street, across to Washington Square, in Waverley Place and Gay
Street, even at last undauntedly attacking the mercenary interests of
Bleecker and Bedford Streets, until a polite and literary or artistic
fever thrilled the city, and gathered together groups of such
models, filling place after place, till the oasis became charming
and entertaining and restful. Like a green and spreading plant that
pushes its way over ash heaps, and up dry and ugly walls, so did the
stupidity of vulgarized and threadbare neighborhoods become decent,
and pure, and lovely, before the tasteful invasion.
This alteration meant a goodly expense. In some instances it meant
the appropriation of whole blocks which became under the treatment,
delicious gardens, blending delightful affectations of antiquity—with
box rows and oleander bushes—with smart contrivances of the day in
horticulture. These inter-urban ruralities sent meandering fingers
into Seventh Avenue and stretched along Hudson Street as far as the
present St. Luke’s while most curiously an outlyer was created in
Varick Street near the rescued St. John’s Church where its altheas
bloomed against the background of the railroad freight depot. The
extension of the movement was then—in the year 2000—well afoot and
pressing for more extension.
Tom reached the Mayor’s house in St. Luke’s Place, and presented the
Mayor’s card. He was received by a quiet faced old lady who sweetly
explained to him she was the mother of the Mayor. He was led through
the broad corridors of the house to a back yard, where he found a
sizeable garage, and a well equipped vehicle. He was told his own
room would be above the ground floor. He felt some curiosity about
_that_, and went up the stairs for its inspection. Perhaps it was not
so bristlingly pretty as the room in the Kohinoor, but it suited him
much better. It was large, and a book-case on one side filled with
the overflows from the house gave it a home like air. The little yard
lay under his windows and he just heard the occasional murmur of the
city life.
Tom thanked his stars and set about an overhauling of the Mayor’s
handsome motor car, in which, that evening, he was to bring the Mayor
home from the City Hall.
The day had waned, but for an hour Helen Lorimer had sat dreamily
resting her head in her hands, as her arms leaned up on the sill of
the broad window, looking straight to the still talus-encumbered
slope of the Palisades. It was a strange idleness. She had loosened
her hair until it flowed down tumultuously over her shoulders, and
she had gazed at her own reflection and even approached the mirror
with a smile of satisfaction. As she mused, or planned, or slept,—it
was a trifle hard to say what she was doing—at the window,—the door
opened softly, and her mother, the dark Julieta entered, and came
almost unheard to her side. There was a start, and as the uplifted
face met her Mother’s, Helen rose, and said; “the Mayor is coming
to see us. I like him immensely.” She kissed Julieta and the two
women—both so beautiful and so contrasted—stood for an instant,
silent, together. What impulse suddenly raised Helen’s arms and made
her fling them about her mother’s neck, and kiss her again with an
ineffable tenderness?
Tom had brought the ruminating Mayor to his home, and that alert
official had bounded up the front steps pushed open the door, sprang
in the drawing room, where his mother sat knitting, and had also put
his arms around her with sudden eagerness, and kissed her. It was
apparently an unprecedented performance, at least in that way and at
that time, for the old lady pushed him back and asked with candid
wonder, “Why Marston! what’s the matter?”
Now it is an inexplicable coincidence, which may or may not interest
the reader, that both these exquisite coquetries happened at very
near the same hour and minute of the day.
CHAPTER VI
THE BEEHIVE
In the year Two Thousand the tides of human travel through Grand
Street had grown beyond all measure. They surged from morn to night
in swaying multitudes in which the admixture of all the races of
the great city were seen and heard. The babel of sound recalled
the thoroughfares of a dozen cities of the world. The East Side,
problem and despair of the twentieth century, remained the enigma of
the twenty-first. Its congestion, at least, had met an approximate
solution. Enormous high tenements had been built there, whose
clustering stories became microcosms of national amalgamation,
wherein were born diverse and blended groups who were endowed with
remarkable pugnacity and a sort of fierce ability to engage in
political argument and metaphysical civics.
They were not devoid of business sense and an inordinate thirst for
money. On the whole they had made a most reputable element in the
public life of the city, but they were prone to excitement, and they
were not American. They responded with Celtic avidity to rhetoric
and poetry, but they were not Irish. They were composed of a mixture
that had outrun the mere boundaries of religious prescription, and
Catholics and Jews in the close companionship of the Russians and the
Italians, Hungarians and Turks had intermarried. These unions had
grown more common, and there was a corresponding drift away from the
orthodox formulas of each church. Socialism as a theory had taken a
remarkable hold upon their imaginations but, though they were poor,
there was no immediate justification for discontent in their lives.
Pauperism was uncommon.
To the resident populations of the East Side, at this point (Grand
Street), and north and south, there were commingled the steady
streams of commerce and industry that crossed the Williamsburgh
bridge at Delancey Street. These converging currents had produced
a vortex of business along Grand Street, and so huge department
stores, a few big and second class theatres, and tailor or clothing
shops with the adventitious association of gregarious restaurants
had grown into a solid wall of many hued occupations. At night the
streets, especially in holiday time, and on the hot nights of summer
swarmed and seethed with the jocund, good natured, and somewhat
highly dressed throngs. The little parkway of the bridge’s approach
on Delancey Street was set with tables and here gathered companies
of friends and fun makers, who were supplied with wine and lager
from the restaurants, while at the entrance of the smaller shops or
stores similar tables had been instituted. The street then assumed
the complexion and the purpose of a great and lengthened caravansary,
or, on such nights when the stores were open, and the side walks
accommodated the warring peddlers, an open air bazaar, or a Kalmuk
fair grounds. The street then blazed with electric lights, and in
front of the theatres and the department stores, the restaurants,
and indeed at every hand, coronas, arches, and surcingles of
lamps, contributed a chaotic confusion of haloes, and reflections
and illuminations, that dispersed the darkness beyond the highest
buildings, and eclipsed the discomforted and neglected moon.
It was in the midst of this multivarious human maelstrom and complex,
that Longtinsky, the Russian, had made his abode, and established his
paper, The Beehive, with which he furthered his insidious agitations
and furnished a not unskillful compound of threats and grievances
with the truth half dressed in fiction, and fiction wearing, a
little stupidly, the mask of truth. The man had ability, and being
unscrupulous, with a tenacious memory and an almost morbid alacrity
in hunting out the peccadilloes of the rich (none of them worse than
his own and his companions) he had gained a clientele, his paper
a sort of subterranean circulation, and himself a modest fortune,
though quite incommensurate with his ambition. Some fancied insults
to him by the organ of the better classes had rankled in his mind,
and he had exceeded propriety and prudence by recent utterances which
were seditious and revolutionary; much more so than usual.
He had been goaded into a blind rage also by the unexpected and most
unwelcome invasion of the district that he thought was peculiarly
fitted for the ripening of his theories of social reform by the
successful propaganda of Helen Lorimer. This had been phenomenally
effective. Its courage fascinated a spirited people, and Miss
Lorimer’s address and personal power, with a well established and
practical commission of mercy was making havoc with Longtinsky’s
reputation and prestige. It drove him to madness, and the fact that
some of his young men-reporters, hired to dog and spy upon the less
wary and more undeserving of the class he hated and plotted against,
had, in their nefarious work encountered the beneficent agencies set
in operation by Helen Lorimer, and having also met that engaging lady
at her own settlement, had been flattered or actually been enslaved
into a sort of devotion, which made of them furious mutineers against
their soi-disant master loosened the last restraint of decency and
caution.
Longtinsky understood well enough his danger. He did not propose
to hang himself for any crime, but he had no hesitation in getting
others into a noose that would have better become his own neck. He
had become depraved to the point of murder, and his selfish and
inflated egotism, provoked beyond endurance into resentment, slowly
degenerated and assumed the worse complexion of brooding, sullen,
hatred, the precursor of the worser incentives to atrocity and
revenge.
The office of The Beehive was behind a clothier’s store not far from
the corner of Pitt Street and Grand. It was entered by a narrow alley
which debouched into Grand Street by a covered shed, and might have
been easily overlooked by any one not accustomed to use it. The alley
threaded, a door, entrenched in the brick wall of a back extension
opened upon a small irregular room which served as the editorial
sanctum, and the council chamber of Longtinsky, and his sympathizers.
Behind this again a small projection shielded the archives and the
printing press of the incendiary sheet.
It was the day after Miss Lorimer had entered her plea for the
reconsideration of the sentence of the convicted Socialists, and
which the Mayor had deferred to with such unction, that a rough and
shaggy looking man, with a slouched hat, half covering features
that might have reasonably craved some such concealment, walked
into the open alley that led to the penetralia of the Longtinsky
establishment. The man showed no hesitation in making his way, and
a shrewd suspicion, that he had been there often before, would
have occurred to any observer who noticed his nonchalant ease, the
half dissimulated scowl with which he turned towards the street,
and scrutinized the passing and oblivious crowds, his slow ingress
through the crooked corridor, and the questioning and companionable
rap that he gave to the inner door which the next instant he pushed
in, and within which he disappeared.
In the furtherance of the ends of this tale we must follow this
figure. The room that the man thus invaded was dark, the few windows
that were intended to help out its interior illumination being
extremely dirty, and in a measure curtained by ragged curtains,
that rivalled in their disarray the neglected panes they partially
covered. A few gas burners had been frequently used to dissipate the
gloom, and the effects of their imperfect combustion were discernible
above them, in sooty patches on the low ceiling. At this particular
moment, although it was almost mid summer, the jets were alight, and
by their helpful aid the visitor, if the matter interested him, could
recognize the two pictures which decorated—or were expected to serve
such a purpose—the walls. One stared him in the face, as he entered
the room. It was a colored chromo of the great Russian novelist
and humanitarian—Tolstoy—depicted in his peasant costume, amid his
ancestral acres, his hat in his hand, and his crumpled and benign
face looking out upon the world he repudiated and failed to save. The
other possessed a less perceptible congruity with the room and the
purposes of its usual occupants. It represented a most commonplace
scene of rurality and domestic peace, and was called Rest at Home.
This pleasing pictorial note in an atmosphere that quite generally
was filled with threats against all such chimerical fancies,
portrayed a farmer’s family, gathered around a hospitably covered
board, in which the artist by a series of conventional imitations
showed the products of the farm, with the ostensible father of the
prosperous and numerous group, standing at one end of the table, his
face upraised, and his hand, in the posture of a blessing, stretched
out over the abundant food; while his sons and daughters in attitudes
of respect or reverence, formed before him a most irreprehensible
assemblage of duty and devotion. The alert mind might have thought
that this unexpected illustration was intended, as an eloquent
reminder, to those assembled below it, of the very thing and things
they were commissioned to upset and prevent.
The remainder of the room’s furnishings requires but a few words.
There was a long narrow table—so narrow as to comfortably allow those
who sat at it to attack their opponents or critics across it—in the
centre of the room, a few chairs, an additional oil lamp on the
table, and in one corner a wooden box of the sturdiest construction,
armed at its corners and along its sides with iron. The door leading
to the editorial precincts beyond was open, and the few operatives
there, could be seen leaning over their tasks or engaged in
conversation which seemed curiously low and timid.
The man whom we thus persistently have followed, overturned a
chair at his entrance, and then striking the table with his fist,
proceeded to reveal his lineaments more completely, by removing
his hat which he threw on the table. He was a short thin man of a
Sicilian type, with black hair which would have abundantly screened
his small head, if it had not been so suspiciously shaven into a crop
of bristling points. His deep set eyes, rather high cheek bones,
prominent nose, regular mouth, shaded by a restrained moustache, a
handsomely chiselled chin, united into a facial whole of properly
noticeable contour and expression. Craft was marked in his face, and
a physiognomist might have been readily led to prognosticate a sum
of evil possibilities in the Italian visage, which again in less
questionable environment might have been mistaken for that of a star
of the opera. So easily do the reflexions of our surroundings lend a
deleterious, or responsible air to our physical personalities!
He wore the clothes of a workingman, somewhat refined by a little
more careful preservation, and by more expensive texture. One
surprising and noticeable feature of his dress was the small shoes
which clothed his feet, made from patent leather, and a scarf and
pin, the former of a brilliant scarlet, and the latter of emerald,
expensive items which shone all the more conspicuously in their plain
and discordant associations. As he rapped the table he flung himself
into a chair, and waited for the response which apparently he fully
understood would quickly follow.
He was not disappointed. A heavy movement of chairs in the
neighboring apartment announced the approach of his host, and the
next instant the broad squat figure of a man filled the doorway,
between the rooms, and the visitor looked lazily up and accosted his
friend.
“Well, Tinsky, have you heard the latest? The Old Man has given a
reprieve and the thing’s to be done over again, and I don’t feel
sure that the nippers won’t get a twist on your wrists this time.
There are some squealers about, and perhaps they are as little
anxious to get the ‘tickler’ as you.”
A curious smile covered the speaker’s face, and at length he raised
his eyes, previously dropped to the floor, and gazed at the editor
of The Beehive with a queer suppressed grin of malice, that was
distinctly irritating.
The man thus accosted was a teuton in type, blond haired, thickly
whiskered, with blue eyes, inconspicuous eyebrows, a short and
heavy frame and a disproportionately developed mouth, and—his most
striking feature—immense ears that protruded from the side of his
head with an unquestionably porcine saliency. For an instant this
aberrant arrangement caught the eye of his observers before they
fully scanned his face. The face itself had a mean look, and this
arose in part from the lowness of the brow and the smallness of the
eyes, but particularly from a misshapen nose, full and drooping
cheeks, and from the formless gap across his face, which served as a
mouth. Had any one unexpectedly encountered him under circumstances
of possible danger they would have instinctively shunned his company
and suspected his intentions. His eyes squinted slightly, and this
added to the sinister and depraved expression of his face. In some
lights, and under the influences of conviviality the editor of The
Beehive might have appeared more reassuring. At this moment pricked
into a momentary aggravation by his remorseless friends, his looks
were disappointing. His eyebrows drew together, his little eyes shone
vindictively, his great mouth twitched with anger, and his malformed
nose, set between them like a red proboscis, displayed its cavernous
nostrils. Longtinsky was distinctively unpleasant to see at that
moment.
“Oh, the jig is not up yet, Pony. I am not afraid of the tyrants. My
arm can wither at my side before I’ll stop the crusade of justice and
liberation I have begun. What about squealers? Do you think I have
anything to fear? Can you or anybody else put any crime at my door.
I don’t want to hear any nonsense and I won’t listen to any threats.
Am I the man to be chased to death by a mad rotten pack of smooth
faced, slick tongued, wine-fed vampires of wealth, men who do the
bidding of that besotted purse-proud boasting wench, Helen Lorimer?
I’ll pull destruction down about their ears. I’ll make this city
Hell-hot for them. If they dare to touch me I’ll burn their roofs
over their heads. Let us see how far the arrogant slaves of money and
gluttonous indulgence dare lift their hands against the sons of toil
and suffering!—”
The speaker had risen in his imprecatory rage, and his body, not
visibly afflicted with any signs of want, pressed against the table,
while the voluble spirit that possessed it glared through the
shrunken blue eyes at the stranger. That person quite imperturbably
waited for the exhaustion of the Socialist leader, and even ventured
to raise an impatient hand as if to check his speech, while at the
few moments when he condescended to look at him at all, something
like a masked grin covered his features. This was not unnoticed by
Longtinsky, upon whom it had an unexpected influence, for, as it
finally forced a loud laugh from his auditor, he stopped and sank
back in his chair with a cowed motion, as if of fear.
“Say!” it was Pony who was talking, “what do you think I am. Perhaps
you had better keep your mouth shut and the tongue in your head
tucked a little closer to your lamb-chops. I don’t want any oratory.
Get that off on your scrubs. I know you, Tinsky, and you know me, or
if you don’t by God, perhaps the time has come for me to show you who
I am. I’ll do it damn quick.
“Now get down to business. Where’s the swag I’m to have for playing
your spy. Don’t you get behind my back and rip me. I know you for a
mean spirited swaggering coward, and I know, Tinsky, as well as you
do, that you did the business for the Settlement House. YOU,” the man
stood up, “put the bombs there YOURSELF; YOU hired the poor wretches
to go in there after you and your fellow—and, damn you, you haven’t
had soul enough to try and save him—Polinck, had started the fuses.
What did you care if they got blown to Hell, as long as you kept your
mouse haired body safe? Well, there’s been a leak somewhere, and that
woman Lorimer has got on to it. She’s wise. Now Tinsky, keep your
soft soap jabber for those who relish it, I want none of it. I’m here
to do you a service. Get out of this. Scuttle the shop and move. The
Mayor and that woman have get their heads together and they’re after
you. The case comes up again next fall and you’re in for it. I want
my money, I want it now, and I want to see the little girl. If it
wasn’t for her I might not have come back. See! Let me see her now,
and let’s start. Get your word twisters off their perches, pull down
your winders, pick up your snacks, tuck some boodle in your breeches,
and get out of this. Canada for us.”
The effect of those adjurations and reproaches upon Tinsky was
remarkable. It only offered another tribute to the force of truthful
words, forcibly uttered. The editor had lost some of his color, some
of which was temper and much of which was beer. His hands nervously
plucked his beard, and he looked at his stormy interlocutor with real
dismay. His bravado had suddenly vanished, and in its place a sullen
discomforting sense of danger overwhelmed him, but it was resisted
by the man’s refractory egotism, and his stolid apathy to advice.
Flight meant surrender, impotence, loss of prestige, it might mean
detection, conviction, and punishment. He could not reconcile himself
to an abject retreat. The danger pictured by his picturesque and
implacable friend was a real one, and yet he shrank from an absolute
disclosure of ineffectiveness and alarm. Under the smarting sense of
guilt his mind, not unfamiliar with labyrinthine devices and coarse
subterfuge, worked fast.
There emerged before him a desperate project, which if successful
would establish his fame, might help him to rid himself of his
embarrassing assistants—such for instance as the man before him—and,
blackened as it was with the aims of murder, might finally light
those fires of insurrection which he fondly thought were latently
glowing in the hearts of the people, would clear the way for his
assumption of power, and—so vividly did the picture work itself
out—lift him into a position of eminence. Once there he might hold
the balance of power and dictate the terms of his own acceptance
and the shape of a future socialist plebiscite. The outlines of
this plan—if plan it could be called which involved many elements
of crime—had been vaguely worked out before in his audacious and
credulous mind, but now at the storming point, when the enemy was
forcing him to bay, when the incredible play of chance seemed to
stretch out to his waiting hand the implement to strike the blow
which would bring him immunity and place, they grew more distinct.
The cerebral convolutions behind that low forehead were intricate;
thought of some inventive force hurried through them with an easy
flow, and designs, pictures, dreams, rose before him with imaginative
poignancy. His fear of danger—a danger which seemed literally
heralded by its messenger before him—his hatred of Helen Lorimer, the
stupid vindictiveness of his nature, which urged him on upon a course
of rapine and disorder, his thirst for wealth, the sudden inner
consciousness that he had been playing false to his own people—though
bribes which he had taken from the “Aristocracy of Wealth” had only
been accepted with hypocrisy and rage—his powerlessness hitherto
before the inertia of the masses, who had failed to raise any
standard of revolt, already broken hearted as they were over the
conviction and condemnation of their companions, his perception that
he had played into the hands of his enemies in doing as he had done,
the residual force of a conviction that he was really working out,
besides his own fortune, a greater destiny for society; all these
considerations drove him to an ultimate step which he often vaguely
realized might be useful.
It now became to his mind a necessity. It was desperate, and like
some tempting demon, it rose before his eyes with beckoning gesture,
though in his hands it carried the weapons of destruction, and its
face was darkened with the shadow of assassination. Longtinsky was
not averse to involving in his plan some steps looking towards the
forcible removal of the unwelcomely candid man who had just entered
his retreat.
Longtinsky had been thinking fast. As his visitor paused Longtinsky
got up, shut the door leading to the inner room more carefully,
and locked it. He moved to the windows and drew down their shades,
then he passed around the head of the table, walked past Pony who
had become a little restive, though he eyed these preparations with
no apparent disturbance, unless a fumbling motion towards his hip
meant anything. Longtinsky closed the outer door—that leading to the
alley—and also locked it. Then he returned to his first seat, leaned
over the table and with a warning finger resting on the corner of his
slovenly lips, looked over curiously to Pony and motioned for him to
come and sit beside him.
[Illustration: “NO FUNNY BUSINESS, OR UP YOU GO IN SMOKE.”
_Page 120._]
That character, hitherto quite indifferent and evidently influenced
by very contemptuous feelings for his friend, whose nature he knew,
as well as some of his subterranean contrivance and plots, had become
by this time aroused into curiosity. He looked at Longtinsky a moment
with a very disagreeable leer, and then he laughed, picked up his
chair and lurched around the table, and put himself at Longtinsky’s
side;
“See here, Whiskers,” Pony’s voice sank to a guttural croak,
“what’s your game now. No funny business, or up you go in smoke,”
and a relevant movement of his right hand brought a six-shooter in
proximity with Longtinsky’s ribs, with such painful effectiveness
that that person’s color vanished, and his deprecatory retreat
backward all but failed to overturn his chair, and deliver him on his
back on the floor of the room. Something humorous shone in Pony’s
eyes, and the next instant after a circular flourish of his weapon at
a variety of objects around the room, he laid it on the table before
him.
“Come Pony,” said Longtinsky, with jocular familiarity, “put it away.
There’s no harm here for you. You’ve known me a long day and there
never was a time when I haven’t been a good friend to you. Put it
away. Jessie might come in here too. It would do you no good with her
to have that iron out.”
The effect of this apostrophe was remarkable. The man grabbed his
revolver, shoved it back in the holster at his hip beneath his coat,
a smile entered his cynical face, as a beam of light might illumine
into seemly grace a patch of darkness; he looked at Longtinsky with
almost a beseeching motion, as he laid his hand caressingly on his
arm:
“Tinsky, is Jessie here? Ah! Tinsky, you’re the father of that girl,
and I _do_ love her! Blast the folly of it, but I’m a child in her
fingers; I’m putty with her. I guess it’s the only thing that makes
me run your errands, and hang at your elbow, like a dangling bell to
a hound’s neck. Come Old Man, what’s your game? Jessie is the prize.
I’m oyster for anything.”
This sudden mollification and surrender was more than gratifying to
the plotting Tinsky. He showed no signs of immediate reassurance,
but he felt the unmistakable power he possessed through the charm of
his daughter for this blackguard’s eyes. Longtinsky laid his hand
on Pony’s shoulders, shrugged his own lightly, and half closing his
little eyes, watching shrewdly his confidant, spoke slowly, in a low
voice, revealing bluntly his nefarious scheme.
“Pony, I’m not going to admit or deny what you’ve said. The high ends
of popular liberation are served by all means the agencies of freedom
find convenient to their hands”—a hostile imprecation, or something
like it intimated to the apostle of the people that that line of
adjustment would hardly be accepted. He continued:
“But we’ll drop that. There is danger for us all in this new move.
That arch contriver Helen Lorimer intends to undermine us by the
hypocrisy of clemency. She is the spring of action behind the Mayor.
She expects to make us suspected by our own people. She is a whited
sepulchre. For her own ends, for her class, for the greed of the
debauched tribe of money-changers she is playing a double part to
catch us in the net of her selfish ends, to thrust down the Eagle of
Liberty—”
“Cut it out! Cut it out! Don’t for God’s sake, don’t cram any more of
that lingo down my throat. What’s your game? Ecco! Out with it. Give
it to me straight. Murder, arson, riot, poison, anything but your
damn rot of fine words and humbug, Tinsky. You’re in this for keeps,
and I’m with you—at least,” and the speaker shoved himself away from
the anxious editor,—“as long as you play fair and game.”
Longtinsky smiled faintly: he knew he must go on. The risk was
considerable, but concealment meant delay—delay, danger, and if this
tool before him turned on him—now that his most faithful henchman
Polinck was languishing in a public jail—there was a slim likelihood
of his accomplishing anything. He was silent for one moment, and
then trying to draw nearer to Pony whose robust criminality always
antagonized his tortuous and deceitful projects, he whispered: “Pony,
_Helen Lorimer must die_.”
This announcement veritably startled his hearer. Pony jumped to
his feet, seized Longtinsky by the shoulders with both hands, and
looked down on him with a ravenous surprise in his eyes, that made
Longtinsky half regret his audacity. But the surprise passed. Pony
had killed his men before. He fell back in his chair, and a kind of
sanguinary unction sounded to Tinsky in his hoarse whisper;
“Good Tinsky—you’re a handsome guy to be plotting murder to save
your own skin, and get a poor devil’s neck, like mine, kinked in
a noose. Work a little quicker, old cut-throat. You know I like
corpses, but just now I’d hate to get into a cold grave myself.”
Encouraged, Longtinsky continued. He dropped the gilded sophistry
of his professional cant, and assumed the prerogatives of an
initiated criminal. His own hatred for the class which constantly
embodied to his eyes his personal enemies, his particular animosity
for Helen Lorimer, whose virtues, goodness, and lofty altruism
were incomprehensible to his sodden nature, except as the mask of
an ulterior ambition, the wretched mess of deception into which
circumstances—largely precipitated by his own waning prestige—had
forced him, his consequent urgent danger, the sudden glimpse afforded
him of a forcible egress into a field of new opportunities, and the
pushing constraint of a kind of feverish despair made him suddenly
truculent, unabashed and reckless.
“Pony,” he began again, “I’ll make a clean breast of it. I blew up
the Settlement House. Polinck and I put the bombs there; Dalzell,
Vinta, Ishpy, Charles Bingo, Fabrizio, Spesca, Rinker, and the rest
were hired to go in, one hour after we lit the fuses. The janitor was
bribed—and—” the speaker grinned diabolically— “it was money from the
Silk Stockings that did it. They sent an agent to him. It was a plot;
that witch Helen Lorimer wanted her House blown up. She meant it to
bring ruin on us. I was fooled. The janitor came to me and promised
to open the place if I wanted him to. He left, the house open, and
went away—and I dropped into the trap. I meant no harm to the men.
Some one had to do it—for the effect—don’t you see—_the effect_. I
thought the East Side would rise,—but the police got wind of it too
soon. The men might have got away, and none the wiser but some one
peached, and that very night when the house burned, and I had started
the revolution—” Longtinsky for an instant looked self-deceived,
as if his aspirations for a New Dispensation, with himself as its
protagonist was a sacred hope, “—that night every reserve in the
city had been doubled, and—you know the rest—six of my men were
nabbed with Polinck; the uprising nipped; locust clubs killed the new
republic.”
By this time Pony was fully interested; he no longer shrank from the
portentous confession. His indolent attention had been replaced by a
very alert ear and eye, and not a word was missed, not a reflexion
of the utterance, in the face of the narrator, escaped him. He had
suspected much of this, some of it he almost could have sworn to.
He felt repugnance for the perfidy of the man who could thus coolly
rehearse all of this with a callous and untouched heart. But it
stimulated his own thoughts, to run rebelliously along a chain of
images, in which he saw Longtinsky dead, and himself with Jessie in
his arms fleeing the country, the demolition of The Beehive, and his
own comfortable existence elsewhere, with a sack of plunder torn from
its vindictive and over credulous editor. The dream pleased him,
and Longtinsky for once shone to him with an interior and native
light of reasonableness, that made him—Pony—urbane and receptive, a
transformation not concealed from Longtinsky, whose perception of it
only made him more communicative and less cautions.
“You see,” continued Longtinsky, “the reprieve will act as a stay to
the execution, of course, and the new trial will not come off until
the fall. That is sure. There is time for me to undo the mischief we
have suffered. I’ll fill The Beehive with storming articles. Careful
you know Pony. I’ll rouse the men we need and I will be bold too;
I’ll let out at that woman again, and she can come back at me. I can
tell her plans to a dot. She will be down on the East Side again; she
will put up some shack and start in with her talks. I’ll bait her
all right, and get her in some sort of an argument and then—with our
men ready—armed, Pony—we do it. _The bomb, Pony, that blows her to
perdition will win you Jessie._”
The speaker paused, watching with a flicker of madness in his
eyes, as he fed by anticipation upon the ruthless sweetness of
his vengeance, and the intoxicating prizes of success, the ardent
countenance of Pony, to whom the offer glittered with all the
radiance of happiness, complete and inexhaustible.
There was a moment’s silence between the men; Longtinsky never lifted
his eyes from the face before him, which responded to an inner
elation, and grew good and wholesome under the gentle influence of
the exultant and comforting thoughts that Jessie’s name aroused.
Longtinsky himself felt the benign touch somehow of his daughter’s
name, and there poured into his lowering glance the restful smile
of a father’s love. Surely Love—thinking of the abused word in
the loftiest sense, as the guerdon of unselfish sacrifice, and
devotion—can work, and it alone, the miracle of Redemption!
Pony extended his hand, and Longtinsky was not slow to grasp it.
“Done. I’m game for the throw, hit or miss. But a bargain’s a
bargain, and _you_ Longtinsky either stick to it, or QUIT BREATHING.”
Again the baleful lights in the eyes of both, and the evanescent ray
of Heaven’s sunshine on their faces faded away with the harvest of
suspicions springing anew in their plotting brains.
There was a light tap on the inner door, which led to the printing
and composing room of the paper, and Longtinsky recognized it; “Here
is Jessie now,” he said, and before he could extricate himself from
the table and chair in whose legs his own had become wound, Pony
leaped to his feet, and opened the door.
How strange are the contrasts of Nature’s works; with what necromantic
art she weaves the dreadful and the harmless, the lovely, together!
How perfectly she contrives—though there is no contrivance, only the
mastery of metempsychosis—to mix her materials, the same material
it would appear, and form from them now a demon, and now an angel.
Or is it in this wise; that a little, Oh! so very little of some
transforming juice of virtue can sway the ferment of a mass of
rougher ruder stuff, making its effect at last beautiful, choice,
and even more exquisite, because forsooth it has risen from its very
opposites. Chemistry in our human arts does such things. Heredity is
a fact, and yet Jessie was Longtinsky’s daughter. There she stood
like some wild and winsome flower, flourishing in the midst of
harshness and commonplaceness and reptilian motives. And so fresh
and lovely! The arch play of her smile like a golden beam falling on
ragged walls and blanched careworn faces, fell on the two men and
their lifted heads bathed in it as if in a benediction.
Jessie Longtinsky—her mother was dead—was Longtinsky’s only child,
and he lavished on her an unselfish care. She had learnt the most
excellent rudiments of an English, German and French education; she
spoke all these tongues; she had musical talent, and she developed
taste and talent. But best of all the graces of an unsullied nature,
a nature so vital and womanly, so confiding, earnest, and hopeful,
so searchingly sincere, so buoyant, and yet very brave, dressed, God
knows how, in the nobility of goodness.
Such graces were hers, and Jessie became them. They became her; it
was an ideality of character and beauty, more piquant and entrancing
because unexpected at first sight. It might have seemed almost
impossible.
Jessie Longtinsky was fair, her hair literally golden, her features
regular and perfectly harmonized, each formed so that it, by the
most delightful collusion with the rest, added to the total witchery
and charm. If hunting for some particular culprit among them all,
that made her win from every one the meed of praise, it might best
be attributed to her eyes, as indeed why not, seeing how joyous and
soulful eyes can be. Jessie’s eyes were indeed most pretty, and they
were not blue, as became convention, in the matter of eyes, with a
fair skin, and the story teller’s golden hair. They were the faintest
green, though that color craved no prominence in them, and often
surrendered its claim, to be considered there at all, to a soft
pearly grayness. And they were such honest eyes! Soft and reminiscent
sometimes they were, and filling unbiddenly with tears, and then the
home of mirth, but perhaps more usually they were tender and grave.
Longtinsky had had great luck in keeping his workmen, because they
were young, and because they could frequently feast their amazed
eyes on Jessie. Some had been ambitious in her regard but none had
been successful, though Jessie managed to make the wound endurable,
being calm and sensible and considerate. Among the habituées of
the Longtinsky establishment—and they were many—Pony, or exactly
Poniatowsky, had proved to be the most formidable suitor. Perhaps
Jessie did not care much for him, but she humored him, she may have
been a little afraid of him, and then her father favored him, _or
seemed to_, and Jessie was a dutiful daughter. Longtinsky, as men
will, even of the roughest, or the worst types, had guarded Jessie
from contact with his own world of men; he did not converse about
the social aims he had, he even kept his own paper out of his house,
not because it was dirty or vile—which it was not—but because it
was violent, sanguinary, maledictory and abusive. Longtinsky knew
that, but these ways were his weapons. Mrs. Longtinsky probably was
an amiable sweet woman, Jessie may have been like her, and so her
father wanted to keep her, feeling too some masculine aversion to a
femininity becoming raucous with debate and policies and doctrines.
As the door opened, Jessie glided past Pony who failed to catch
her, and stood apart from the men turning from one to the other as
if questioning their purpose to be locked up there. Then she looked
around the room, which she seldom entered, in which no trace of that
clean housewifery she practised in the story above the press room,
and where Longtinsky dwelt, was visible. Her glance was furtive and
shrinking, the place was distasteful; its staleness and meanness
oppressed her, there lurked in it an unavoidable meaning of crime.
She somehow felt that.
“Father, do let me change all this. I can. You won’t know it. With
clean windows and curtains, fresh paper, lamps, a new ceiling,
scrubbed floor, and that pretty old furniture in the attic; why it
will be so different, so pleasant!”
“Now Jessie that wouldn’t do at all, not down here. If you made
everything spick and span, we couldn’t think as well. It is hard
enough sometimes to say what we want to say in the style we want, but
because we don’t have to think where we are, and what’s about us, we
do better. Come my girl, leave us. Pony and I have some things to
talk about, which you aren’t interested in. Go up stairs.”
The voice of the speaker had lost its querulous murmur, and was
soothing and even affectionate, with a plausible earnestness that
discovered to the listener a father’s heart. And indeed there
flickered up in Longtinsky, when Jessie was near him, a tenderness
that would have saved him from many unruly and wicked impulses. It
was the psychic radiance of her own excellence that brightened the
dusky souls that came near her, and warmed their sensibilities, such
as they had, into a responsive vigor. Jessie sat down, and a cloud
of some sort of sadness passed over her face. Pony had been intently
watching her, with now and then a perturbed glance at his rumpled
clothes, which were not the habiliments he usually wore when anxious
to move Jessie’s reluctant heart.
Pony considered himself the recognized swain of Jessie, though it
would have been regarded as a mere piece of self flattery, a quite
unsupported assumption, by any one permitted to study Jessie’s
attitude towards him. She frankly did not like him, though Pony was
at his best with her, and really loved her, and because he did,
and was quite willing to go any lengths in supporting his claims,
against all rivals, he, by a rustic and aboriginal force of argument,
concluded she belonged to him, a conclusion not always agreeable to
Longtinsky, and certainly not approved by Jessie herself.
Pony started towards her, with a smile of pleasure in his face,
that intimated the probable intention of an osculatory salute, when
Jessie moved quickly away to the further end of the table. A frown
troubled Pony’s features, and threatened to break out in a stormy
expostulation, when Jessie unexpectedly fixed the attention of the
two men by a raised warning finger.
“Father, there are men outside in the yard watching the house. They
came in through the alley a minute ago. I think they may be there
yet. They may be your enemies!” Jessie of course knew her father was
engaged in a propaganda of a civic nature, and the best sides of a
humanitarian socialism appealed to her quite naturally. These she
heard, and was honestly led to feel that the rich were the enemies
of her class, of her father, of progress. She was cognizant of the
higher types of socialism, as she had become acquainted with it in
the books of Hilquitt, Marx, and others.
The recent riot, deaths, and the arrest of the conspirators, had
been viewed by her with terror, and yet with an exalted conviction
of its necessity. Through the sacrifice of the martyrs, she had been
told, Liberty came into the world, and always would so come. She
saw the sufferings of the very poor, and she exerted a beneficent
influence among them, working with an eager sympathy for their good
and improvement. She had in this wise done much to strengthen her
father’s power, and the affection bestowed on the daughter was an
effectual aid in assisting the projects of the father. But lately
Jessie, unsuspected by Longtinsky, had come under the spell of Miss
Lorimer, and the result threatened to bring about a little alienation
for his schemes. However her love for him was true, and when that
day, looking from the upper windows of the rear tenement, in which
they lived, she saw the usually empty yard invaded by the strangers,
and noticed their equivocal actions, she became alarmed, and had,
for this reason, interrupted the unhealthy machinations of the two
friends.
The two listeners to this startling news, jumped to their feet, and
tiptoed to the window, on the yard side, and cautiously raising the
corner of the shade, peered into the little yard which had been made
into a grass plot, worn irregularly into bare patches, by the feet of
those who frequented it, when, on summer nights, Longtinsky gathered
there his sympathizers and co-workers, to smoke, and drink, and
reform the crooked and nodding earth.
The view obtained under the lifted curtain was a very imperfect and
partial one, but there indeed were the intruders walking towards
the door of the room, where the watchers crouched. Neither Pony
nor Longtinsky stirred, and Jessie behind them, trying to reassure
herself over their shoulders, was quite still. Their common
apprehension that the men would next instant present themselves for
admission, at the door, was relieved when, with a last glance above
them, and a review of the few features of the yard, the new comers
turned into the alley and vanished. Pony stole to the door, opened
it, and creeping outward, saw them disappear into the street, and
the next instant an automobile puffed, shirred, tooted, and moved
away through the throbbing thoroughfare, and in it sat—our former
acquaintances—Mr. Benton Briggs, the mayor’s secretary, and Tom
Ratler.
Now it happened, naturally that Jessie had not detailed the
circumstances of her discovery, but that incident had consequences
that later developed into pleasing importance. When Jessie discovered
Mr. Briggs and his companion in the yard, she was at an open window
engaged in watering some of her flower charges, and her particular
bent attitude or position, had shot a tide of color into her face,
so that when she raised herself and gazed down on the men, the eyes
of Tom Ratler met a vision of beauty, which the rapidly working
appreciation of that susceptible youth, approved as being the
sweetest thing they had ever seen. And—happily let us say—this was
not unreciprocated for, in the nascent powers of her own healthy
observation, Jessie felt aware that the young man underneath her
windows was particularly good-looking.
The immediate consequences of an encounter, fraught with such mutual
pleasure, vary greatly, according to circumstances and temperament,
but with Tom Ratler it produced a strong hope—not shared by Mr.
Briggs—that he might have confided to him further work in the capture
of the Longtinsky household. It seemed to him that his intervention
was necessary, for the security of the defenceless and innocent
maiden connected as he discovered,—from Mr. Briggs—by a filial
relation to the obnoxious Longtinsky. As to the effect of the same
encounter with Jessie herself, it deepened her repugnance for Pony,
and made a fluttering sensation discernible in the neighborhood of
her heart, that, with more sophisticated girls, would have been
indubitably assigned to recondite and tender sympathies.
There was some natural confusion of mind, a little trepidation
perhaps, caused by this interruption, and when Pony had returned,
Longtinsky and he exchanged irresolute glances which finally adjusted
themselves into a settled stare of wonder, while through all this
mute interchange of ocular interrogation Jessie stood apart, with her
own eyes questioning each of the conspirators. At length Pony broke
out;
“I tell you Longtinsky: it’s cut for you. That young chap is the
Mayor’s shover, and the old dog is his secretary. They’re on a spying
trip; looking the ground over, and before you can say Jack Robinson
they’ll have the service men down here, and the whole outfit under
lock and key.”
While he was speaking Longtinsky’s head was, metaphorically, whirring
with the soundless revolutions of all its interior clockwork, wheels,
cogs, and pins. He saw too, that there was a suggestion, in this
sudden visit of inspection on the part of the Mayor’s forces of just
such a predicament and complication as would allow him to reanimate
and reestablish his prestige.
He could now, if the attack was made, the suppression of his paper
attempted, raise an outcry against the tyranny of such suppression,
the danger of Star Chamber proceedings against the freedom of the
press and, sounding the tocsin of alarm over the encroachments of
government upon the Palladium of liberty. He might add recruits to
his cause, drawn from a class usually out of sympathy with him, while
his own followers could be roused into an acute resentment. This
latter fanned into a blaze, might create the kind of conflagration
he needed for his own escape from censure, and for the completion
and execution of his felonious designs. These possibilities rapidly
formed themselves in his mind into a logical chain of events, which
expeditiously utilized, would immensely further his plans.
He turned sharply to his daughter and said: “Jessie go up stairs, and
leave us. You were right to tell us about these spies, and now Pony
and I must talk over the matter. Do go!” He approached his daughter
whom he truly loved, and putting his hand around her neck kissed
her with an ardor that reacted dangerously on Pony’s self-control.
That envious gentleman hurried also to Jessie’s side, and was in the
act of throwing both his arms around her, when she sprang sideways,
escaped him and fled.
Pony’s pursuit was unsuccessful, and he fell over a chair which sent
him sprawling against the wall. He was up in an instant, and furious
with disgust and disappointment. He would have renewed the chase, had
not Longtinsky shut the door past which Jessie had fled, through the
press room to her own quarters, and placed himself in the way of the
infuriated lover.
Pony stopped; it was not Longtinsky’s formidable frame that caused
him to pause; a sudden thought of the handsome Tom Ratler, whom he
had seen before, connected itself with the flight and reluctance of
Jessie to submit to his embraces. The idea suffocated him. It made
him fall back into a chair with a groan and a curse and then his
hands clutched the table, he shook it, as if the desperation of his
jealousy would reek itself upon this insensate object.
“Damn him,” he cried, “let him come between me and Jessie, and I’ll
tear his liver out of his black body. No I’ll do better than that.
I’ll mark him for life; I’ll slash his pretty face into strips, and
break his legs. A monkey on crutches. Ha! Ha! A fine figure he’ll cut
then,” and the fiend gloating over his imaginary revenge drew his
knife and struck the table before him with repeated blows.
Longtinsky watched this outbreak with some satisfaction. His
acrobatic mind saw that through the incentives of this jealousy
on the part of Pony, he could engage that desperate man to do his
bidding. He could involve all his enemies—the antagonists of his
propaganda—in this man’s hate, and when the moment arrived and the
blow was to be struck he could inflame his exasperation to the point
where Helen Lorimer—Longtinsky’s rage against this woman partook of
the nature of a mania—would become confused or identified with his
personal rival, and, relying on his furious love for his daughter,
through Pony’s arm, he might strike her down. At present he must
decamp, but so arrange things that the police should seize the
place—which he would make an empty trophy by its evacuation—and then
he would elsewhere publish his grievances and ring the changes upon
an outraged liberty.
“Listen to me, Pony,” said Longtinsky to the glowering lover, “all
that in time, but now we must get out of this, and save the plant.
To-night you must help me to move. There’s a house up Pitt Street
that I can get into and there we will go, Jessie and all. In spite of
them all we’ll print The Beehive, and we’ll make it hotter than ever.
Understand! Come! there’s no time to lose. Remember you stay with us
and—” it was his decisive stake “—play the game right, and Jessie is
yours.”
Pony leaped to his feet and seized Longtinsky’s hand and the two men
disappeared into the inner sanctum.
That night and for some succeeding nights there was much smothered
activity in the region of the office of The Beehive. Pony and
Longtinsky now banded together in a confirmed partnership wherein
the motives of the second outstripped the merely egotistic designs
of the first, were busy with the removal of the various archives of
the socialistic paper, and engaged too in a wholesale destruction
of the more compromising issues of the past year. They worked
efficiently and Pony derived a gratification from the occasional help
of Jessie who had learned from her father of the impending removal.
The old office was left intact with its signs and furniture but the
presses were taken to a new retreat in Pitt Street, not far from
the site of the ruined Settlement House, and the preparations made
for the continuous printing of the paper, but, under the fear of
some impending blow, their distribution was secretly arranged, and
at the same time the bitterness of their editorials increased. They
instilled insidiously a poisonous venom against society, and they
craftily wove into all their allusions the name of Helen Lorimer as
the embodiment of the wrongs the deluded readers were convinced they
suffered. Yet all this was not unopposed; the contingent which Miss
Lorimer had gathered around her at the Settlement was very faithful,
and Longtinsky regarded with alarm the preparations for rebuilding
the Settlement House. The moment must be soon improvised for his
blow, wherein the purpose of outright murder steadily and grimly
deepened.
CHAPTER VII
THE MAYOR’S VISIT
The Mayor had been very punctual in keeping his engagement with Miss
Lorimer. He was standing in the wide parlor of the Lorimer mansion
into which he had been ushered by a servant apparently already
apprized of his expected visit, so felicitously suave was that
person’s reception of him, and so unhesitatingly was he conducted
over the hallway to the great parlors.
The room or succession of rooms, in which he found himself was a
superb example of architecture and decoration. The effect of a
kind of compromise between colonial spaciousness and simplicity in
the proportions of the room, and a Louis Quinze elaboration in its
furniture, was not as disquieting as might have been anticipated,
seeing too that the villa in many aspects was an Italian creation.
The ceilings were high, the windows broad, and almost destitute of
the framed arrangement of heavy mouldings; the cornice of the room
was scarcely emphasized, the windows descended to the floor.
The decorative features were a treatment in gold and pink with the
chairs and sofas upholstered in Du Barry satin, garlands of painted
roses delicately imprinted the flat ceiling, high mirrors framed in
gilt surmounted marble mantels overhanging generous hearths, and
the august dignity reached an intellectual note and emphasis in the
few large and many smaller paintings which were, with one or two
exceptions, the works of American artists, and were, for the most
part, landscapes. The three exceptions were religious subjects, being
carefully executed copies of The Assumption of Murillo, The Flight by
Correggio, and a Holy Family by Domenichino.
Great rugs were spread over the marqueterie floor, Du Barry pink
satin curtains, overspreading lace portieres, hung at the windows, a
grand piano was accommodated in a swelling niche on one side, and the
chandeliers intricately composed, and thrown into a sort of bizarre
relief by white enamel threads upon them, supported a galaxy of
opalescent globes lit with electric lamps.
It was evening and in summer. The Mayor entered the brilliant
and glowing room, walked admiringly towards an Inness which hung
almost opposite the entrance of the parlors, and then sat down in a
convenient chair, his eyes eagerly inspecting the delicate opulence
about him. Near him was a remarkable table—a creation in ivory and
ebony—and he noticed a few book-cases holding books bound in white, a
few marble sculptures were revealed, and a snowy owl, upon an ivory
bracket loomed upon him as at least, if not tasteless, an indiscreet
note in the beautiful rooms.
A moment later and his eyes encountered, approaching him from the
distant end of the room two female figures, one of whom he quickly
recognized, though now Miss Lorimer came to him in a sort of aureole
of summer emanations—her dark hair unadorned—and wearing a faintly
blue ashen gown, the sleeves caught thrice about her arms with black
velvet loops. A brooch of blood red Mexican opal set with emeralds
was at her neck, catching the lapels of a frilled white collar which
rose upon her neck, while around her waist a quaint armorial belt,
fastened with an old and lustrous Chinese buckle, holding a purple
fluorite and a green jadeite, added a note of exotic culture. She was
radiant, and as the young man rose to his feet his face brightened
into an appreciation which spoke almost too plainly his own
admiration. Julieta was with her daughter, and her matronly outline
and the dark color of her garb was a foil to the latter’s interesting
loveliness.
“Your Honor, my Mother,” was the salutation of Miss Lorimer, who
seemed eager to begin the serious work before them. The gentleman
bowed and expressed his pleasure, and then as Mrs. Lorimer spoke
of her daughter’s mission in connection with the new trial of the
prisoners seized at the time of the destruction of the Settlement
House, Helen Lorimer herself pushed a table forward, drew three
chairs up to it and rang a bell.
Answering the summons a servant appeared with a number of portfolios,
and almost at the same moment the parlor doors swung apart, and Mr.
Theodore Lorimer accompanied by a broad featured gentleman entered.
Introductions followed, and the Mayor learned that Mr. Lorimer’s
companion was the clever and industrious lawyer who had discovered a
mass of new evidence, and was willing to stake his reputation upon
his complete ability to prove that five of the men under sentence,
had nothing to do with the disastrous explosion and fire, leaving the
guilt weighing heavily on the sixth, Polinck, Longtinsky’s confidant,
and with a preponderant disposition of the facts pointing to the
central and animating spirit of mischief as residing in Longtinsky
himself.
Mr. Moser was a short man with a relentless intimation of power in
his expression. Somehow it rested in his broad shoulders, clean
shaven and pugnacious jaw, his small deep set and musing eyes, the
crisply moving thin fingers and particularly in his thin lips that
closed against each other in a vise-like way that suggested an
interior mental grasp as tight as this physical analogue.
When the portfolios had been opened and the entire party was seated
at the table, Mr. Moser rose up, and developed his position. It was
admirably done. It was clear; it seemed unmistakably certain that Mr.
Moser could prove the points which came out with bristling alacrity.
He made them in a matter-of-fact way, quite devoid of parade, and in
a conversational undertone, with a relieving gesture, and now and
then, especially aiming them at the Mayor, a convincing puckering of
his tense eyebrows:
“Longtinsky has a serpent’s tongue and the brain of a demon. The
men about him are his dupes. He plays them as you might play cards.
He holds them in his hand and no scruples interfere with his using
them for his own profit and their ruin. And yet he is a clumsy
contriver. The simple confound the wise. A child steps in, and his
fabric of deceit tumbles into pieces. It is a play-loving child,
with a dash of curiosity, just a trace of the sleuth strangely
developing—a fine prophetic instance of tendency Sir. This child
drawn by some peculiarity in Longtinsky’s looks follows him; shows
an old age interest in the man. And why? Because Longtinsky gave him
a picture book. This inflamed the child’s imagination. It exerted
some hypnotic influence. By a queer coincidence the book contained
an illustrated story of a Russian nihilist, and the boy identified
him with Longtinsky. He follows him, shadows him, if you will, a
very mania of pictorial identification seized him. In Longtinsky he
saw the hero of his story. In every incident he caught a reflexion
of the episodes of his tale. Longtinsky either mistook his devotion
or it was unobserved, or the tender years of this boy deceived him.
The boy hung round his printing office; he was amused by Longtinsky
who gave him blocks and toy type to play with. Longtinsky may have
dreamed that the child would grow up into a keen edged accomplice in
his games. At any rate he took little notice of the boy’s incessant
observation, and he never suspected his sensitive memory.
“Every impression remained there, and they remained marvellously
distinct. There are no shadows among them. The child’s mind is a
photographic plate. The child was also attracted by Miss Lorimer. He
was one of the visitors at the Settlement House, and made good use
of its advantages. But it was a different sort of attraction. He had
absorbed Longtinsky’s hatred for this excellent benefactor and mixing
up the impressions of his hero in the Russian story he made out for
himself that Longtinsky was the victim of persecution directed by
Miss Lorimer.
“This boy was at the very centre of the operations that turned the
Settlement House into ashes. He saw the bombs taken from Longtinsky’s
office of The Beehive at night to the Settlement House. It was a
night when the House was watched, the Janitor was away: there was
collusion somewhere. Four men brought those implements of destruction
there. TWO OF THEM WERE LONGTINSKY AND POLINCK. This boy although
obsessed by an incredible devotion to Longtinsky never revealed his
feeling but like some parasitic thread of life clung to him, slipped
on behind him unknown, stood in the shadow of the doorways, slunk
from retreat to retreat along the streets. He too was vitally active
as if driven by a flame of madness. He saw everything and, what was
more astonishing, he understood. He lived through it all, the life
of his hero in the Russian tale. He slunk among the conspirators as
their unseen or unnoticed Nemesis. His parched and contracted nature
became monomaniacal with a detective precocity. His mind like wax
took impressions that were retained as if in steel.
“This strange object I met—after Miss Lorimer had engaged me to look
into this case—I saw him at the ruins of the Settlement House, and
something—as he stood on the brink of the smoking excavation—piqued
my curiosity—not averse Sir, to finding evidence in the smallest
scraps—and I spoke to him. I found out that he had been in the House
a few minutes before the explosion, that he knew Longtinsky. His
warped precocity of observation had not changed a natural childlike
simplicity for he was easily led on into the startling admission that
showed that Longtinsky and Polinck had placed the bombs in the House
themselves, had afterwards taken into the House the men who have been
accused and convicted of the crime at the moment when the bombs were
lit. This dodging boy had followed Longtinsky and Polinck in, when
they placed the fuses. Afterwards Longtinsky escaped to his home,
and left it to Polinck to inveigle and desert the victims of their
mutual treachery. Polinck would have gotten away too except for the
time lost in making the oil and rag fires that consumed the place.
The boy has no parents but lived with some family who pitied his
lonely condition and he wandered about the streets almost unobserved
and uncared for. His peculiar temperament developed into a queer
intensity of moroseness wherein the seeds of his unnatural attachment
to Longtinsky grew and flourished.
“After the catastrophe this boy seemed stunned, and I met him at
a psychological moment, when he needed a confessor. He craved the
opportunity to tell all he knew and by some reversion as strange
as his former hallucination, he now believes it necessary to do
something for the men whom he saw taken by the police. Some of these
men have protested their innocence of the exact crime, but the
circumstances of their apparent participation were too strong against
them. This boy your Honor will exculpate them, and I believe that
he will keep the rigid immobile steadiness of his story under the
fiercest cross-examination. He is of course uncorroborated by others,
and it remains to be seen how his narrative will effect a jury. On
him Sir, we pin with certainty our conviction that the men now under
judgment of death will be freed.”
“Where is this boy?” said the Mayor.
Miss Lorimer rose and in a few moments returned with the singular
being, whose abnormal and subtle watchfulness had put so complete a
reversal upon the course of events with the suspects.
As the boy came up to the table the Mayor rose, and his example was
followed by all present. The boy stood in the centre of a wondering
group. He was a creature likely to attract attention among those
accustomed to interest themselves in a face as the symbol and
expression of the nature beneath it. Extremely thin, with a stunted
effect produced by the drooping of one shoulder, and his cross-eyed
vision, his arms would excite wonder at once. They were so long. His
hands were flat and bony, and by some sort of interior nervousness
they seemed to be constantly in motion, twitching or seizing his
clothes as if worried by their fit or arrangement. His face would
have attracted attention any where, but it would also have been
the attention of sympathy and commiseration. It was at every point
almost disfigured and misshapen. The eyes were not on a level and
the ears were curiously small and shrivelled, his forehead, as in
hydrocephalics, was swollen and protuberant, his nose was a sharp
ridge and his cheeks were sunken. Only his mouth bore the traces
of an infantile charm, and it was perfectly formed and opened
over perfect teeth. This latter feature conjoined with the deep
clustering and raven darkness—lustrous too as a raven’s wing—of his
abundant hair, redeemed his physiognomy and imparted a singular elfin
weirdness to it, at least it raised the baffling surmise that his
face was made in two parts, a worser and a better half, and their
discord reflected some temperamental confusion, some alternating
balance of moral or mental tendency. His eyes seemed to dread the
light, and he kept them cast down, which further imparted a dead and
expressionless vacancy to the rather blighted and uninteresting face.
This blankness remained only when his eyes were averted. Raised and
opened, they became partially corrected in their alignment, by the
frequent flashes of excitement they betrayed, and then intelligence
entering his expression, his vexed and ill treated features gained
something in orderliness, or the more repugnant hid themselves, and
were forgotten, under this exaltation. He was short for his years,
and pale, with flushes of color coming at the moments of excitement.
He was a small boy with excellent proportions of body other than
in the simian arms and the defect of the drooping shoulder. In him
again Miss Lorimer had turned the tables upon her antagonist. Angelo
Shimura was an idolator. He craved objects of worship; they remained
with him in his waking moments as supernatural incentives to his
devotion. The subtlety and strength of his attachment had been tested
with Longtinsky, as a mere objective personality, upon which he must
lavish his imaginative attributes. But in reality his heart had not
been warmed, and in that heart lay the unappeasable fires of the most
slavish self-sacrifice.
The shock of the terrific incident which he had watched in its
growth into a tragic issue had perhaps shattered that first extreme
and provisional adherence; and now, brought under the power of a
lofty nature, and fed with the nutriment of sympathy, his little
passionate soul became steeped in love for his benefactress. In that
company, whenever he raised his eyes, they sought the face of Miss
Lorimer, as a dumb wistful yearning animal follows with unquestioning
faithfulness and service its master’s. Its pathos touched the young
Mayor, and his own heart followed the boy’s to the same goal.
When Mr. Moser had finished his short story after adding a few other
more emphatic affirmations of his complete confidence to bring about
a reversal of the conviction of five of the six men—Polinck always
should be excepted—the company again took their places around the
table, with the boy sitting alongside of Miss Lorimer and catching in
a queer studious way the drift of the dialogue though his attention
was more shown by the movement of his head than by the glances of his
eyes.
The Mayor had become thoroughly aroused and felt deeply his
indebtedness to Miss Lorimer for her interference. It had probably
saved him and the community from a serious weight of remorse and
opprobrium. Already the stay of the execution had been ordered by
the Mayor, and the further steps to secure a new order for a trial
were agreed upon. The case could not be now considered before the
fall, and in the meanwhile it was hoped that the Mayor’s action would
not meet censure. The diagrams and drawings in the portfolios were
inspected. Many of them showed the stages in the construction of the
old Settlement House, one was a photograph of the fire, another was
of the prisoners and a third, of the most significant interest in
their present hunt, was a chance photograph of Pitt Street, made by
some wandering tourist engaged in a dilettante search for reminders
of “the slums,” in which appeared two figures recognizable as
Longtinsky and Polinck standing upon the opposite side of the street,
and looking upward to the walls of the Settlement House, while far
from them crouching in a doorway was the odd figure of the haunting
Angelo Shimura.
The Mayor was surprised to see among these sketches, a series of
perfected drawings for a new Settlement House, larger and more ornate
than its predecessor and designed to comprise a Museum. On this
point Miss Lorimer became eloquent. Her animation was intense and
the charmed young man listened to her with delight. The nobility of
her design heightened the fires burning brightly in his own heart,
of sympathy with the “submerged,” and those to whom the chances of
recreation and distraction are denied, the strangely forgotten units
of life, who somehow must be masoned into the structure we call “The
Nation,” and from whom, in the lottery of Fortune’s choice, great
destinies may arise, or more practically, immense acquisitions of
sane sentiment be won.
“The large museums” said Miss Lorimer, “are a long way off from the
people I intend to help in this way. A museum, like a library, should
be constantly used. Repetition tells, and memory makes a permanent
record when it is deeply graven by iteration. Then it seems to me
no museum, as I find them, does the work that can be done for these
people in the most helpful way. Everything is remote and difficult
in its presentation, or else simply pictorial. And my museum will be
composite, and it will be national. I mean that there will be history
and art and science in it, but all these will be concerned with
America and its interests and objects.”
“I don’t imagine,” said the Mayor laughing, “that you intend to
nationalize astronomy, for instance. We can hardly pretend to any
monopoly of the stars.”
“You must not ridicule my project, Sir. Let me show you what I mean,
in a way at least. Come and see my own museum. I have one in this
house.”
“Indeed may I see it?” said the Mayor eagerly, “I may not know what
you mean to do, but I can understand what you have done.”
“Yes, that would please me,” Miss Lorimer answered, as she rose
and explained to the company her intention of giving the Mayor an
object lesson in her “improvised museum at the top of the house.”
She invited the others to accompany them, but Mr. Moser and Mr.
Theodore Lorimer had a discussion under way, which they could not
afford to interrupt, and Julieta excused herself. Thus the Mayor and
Miss Lorimer went together through rooms and corridors, up staircases
where niches rose imposingly on either side, adorned with sculptures,
and at last entered the high attic, into a broad and long room set
around with cases, occupied with tables, and somewhat divided into
alcoves, while the windows were breaches in the walls, opening out
upon the topmost balcony, which overlooked the trees, and now at
night commanded a far-spread network of twinkling lights.
The place was singularly pleasant, and the feeling of physical
elevation, as now and then the eye caught a moving barge of lights
upon the Hudson or the halloo of shouts rose from the velvety
darkness beneath, seemed grateful. The Mayor noticed that the objects
promiscuously heaped around and in almost unrestrained confusion were
for the most part pictures, prints, etchings, woodcuts, framed and
loose, with pottery, porcelains, statuettes, and furniture. There
were few of the usual accessories of the Natural History museum;
a few shells in a case, a specimen, of large size, of quartz or
feldspar or calcite, some gorgeous bird, a stuffed small animal, and
a rather amusing collection of fossils. The Mayor had some scientific
proclivities and a well developed appreciation of the objects of
nature.
Miss Lorimer observed his surprise. “No,” she said, a slight blush
mounting in her cheeks “I have not been very anxious for the
regulation display of a scientific museum, and that is not quite what
I intend to make mine in the Settlement House. I must confess art
and history appeal so much more to me. It would be very foolish for
anyone to complain of Science but—Well, I will be frank and disparage
myself in your eyes—I _do_ not love Science. IT TRIES TO EXPLAIN
TOO MUCH. I can’t help but think of it,” Miss Lorimer was laughing
now, “as a near sighted and precise middle aged gentleman, who sees
everything through his glasses which must be brought at short range
with the things he is looking at. They are very clear to his eye, but
they have no atmosphere, and the poetic—might I say—the religious
lights, and the broad vistas escape him altogether. Labels and names,
nomenclature and theories make up his life. He stumbles a good deal
because he does not see very far beyond his nose, and yet I will say
his intentions are excellent, and he does much good, but because he
is near sighted he breaks beautiful vases filled with flowers, and
puts his defacing hand on many a fresh picture.”
“Well,” retorted the Mayor, “you must admit that science has made
our everyday life more healthful and convenient; that it has taught
us a great deal, and influenced us to think more of just those
unfortunates whom you desire to help. Would you really care to see
science less powerful in this wonderful modern world?”
“Why, no,” answered the lady as the two sat down upon a bench placed
in the recess of a window, “I think of science as a handmaid to the
arts of life, as a purveyor of the necessities, making us comfortable
and keeping us healthful. It is quite irreproachable but, can you
love it?”
The Mayor’s pale face flushed, and the beautiful look returned to it
which had for an instant enthralled Helen Lorimer when she met him
in the City Hall. She looked at him intently. He rose as if confused
or pained, and walked a few steps away. A fine Barbazon bronze stood
upon a table at his elbow, and he answered, looking at this, as if
finding his text somewhere in its graven lines.
“Science _does_ keep us sane and real. Romanticism, the sort the
Germans encouraged two centuries ago, can hardly live in the world of
science. As to loving it, those who follow science seem to surrender
themselves to it with a feeling as deep, or deeper, than even Love
would ask of men. It possesses them like an inspiring demon. Perhaps
that abnegation of all interests to the one great call of Wisdom is
only realized in the more profound and zealous, but it is there,
_with them_. Why! to add one little scrap to the pages of knowledge,
just to put there a new unobserved fact, imparts a curious elation.
But as to Love—Ah! well love is something different.”
“Yes,” Miss Lorimer’s voice was low, as if she too had surrendered to
a train of interior reflections, “love is more human than Science. It
cherishes old faiths, old things, its rays are not the concentrated
radiance from patent reflectors, but the old sweet sort of light that
you see in a woman’s eyes.”
“Why not a man’s, also?” softly whispered the Mayor, who left his
absorbed contemplation of the bronze, and stood near Miss Lorimer.
“Well—” she answered, “I suppose so too, but—it is a concession
which must not be made too much of. There is good authority for
believing women monopolize that kind of illumination. Do you recall
Shakespeare’s adage?”
“Yes, but” retorted the young man “the same poet has put in the
mouths of men the deepest and the truest things about love.”
“Of course,” laughed his companion, “men are great soothsayers. I
think a very wise jester in Shakespeare averred that.
“Let me show you my meaning, the hope I have of putting in the new
House, over there on the east side, something more useful to the
people than labelled insects and shells and fossils. I want to have
a series of rooms each one of which will be a page of history as
it were, that is, a section of historic time, and, as the visitor
passes from one to the next, he will feel the changing atmosphere of
the rolling ages. It will be the paleontology of culture. Instead of
fossils arranged to show the evolution of animals you shall here see
the evolution of the human idea of living.”
“It’s a grand thought, but perhaps it is larger than the space you
have to put it in,” said the Mayor.
“I think, Sir,” and the speaker moved closer to him and looked almost
inquiringly into his face, “you intend to jest with me. But I will
have your submission. Let me show you how well even in a small way
this all can be done. I intend to do it with pictures, a few small
replicas of buildings, and some figures, with just enough archeology
to make the pictures and the figures real. Be patient with my good
intentions and remember I have chosen you for my ally.”
“There are some reserved rights of criticism for an ally,” said the
Mayor, taking up the border of a tapestry which hung near them.
“But I should be, I fear, a poor critic. My allegiance is too
unquestioning.”
“Well you shall have privileges. In my scheme there are aspects of
civics to be considered. That will be your affair.”
“Perhaps,” the Mayor whispered in serio-comic tone, “We ought really
to consult Briggs?”
Helen laughed outright; “OH! that Cerberus. No, indeed. He would
discover some means to ruin all my plans. He is implacable. He will
not forgive me his discomfiture at the Hall. He sees in me the
embodiment of a rabid useless philanthropy which is about as bad in
his eyes as the red Jacobinism he fears in the _sans culottes_. But
you approve of me don’t you?”
The speaker turned upon the young man the appealing beauty of her
face and the gesture was too significant not to escape the jealous
attention of her hearer, who never felt so happy.
“Miss Lorimer, my admiration of what you are attempting is a good
deal deeper than approval. I think I am not careless in using words,
when I say that I love you for what you are doing and have done.”
A red tide of color flushed Helen Lorimer’s face, her eyes sought the
floor, and the Mayor looked at her with a wondering smile, which was
an excellent index of his feeling that his words were not resented.
There was a short silence and then Miss Lorimer rose, and moved
towards the opposite end of the long room, while she half turned and
invited the Mayor to follow.
“I have indeed made a step forward in my plan. Come and see the
Egyptian phase. I call these phases of civilization—chapters. It is
the great book of life I wish to show these people, as if the human
mind advanced in cycles of development, and each of these cycles was
a chapter in a continuous history. There will be rooms, each room a
chapter, each chapter successional to the others that precede it. But
that is not all—not all—I have so much to show you.”
They stopped a moment at the door of a room, which when opened,
revealed a half arranged assortment of maps, pictures, models,
apparel, with a number of stereoscopic cameras, and relievos,
all illustrating scenes, customs, and the ruins of Egypt. There
were here great portfolios filled with drawings, photographs, and
colored sketches. A number of well made relief maps showed the
configuration of the ancient country, while small but exquisitely
executed restorations of temples, propylons, sphinxes, obelisks,
occupied a table in the middle of the apartment. There was the usual
miscellaneous assortment of scarabaei, glass vessels, vases, mortuary
images, ises, and one sarcophagus.
Miss Lorimer viewed them all with pride, though she was silent for an
instant as if estimating the forlorn confusion among these crowded
reminders of the past; but her embarrassment quickly vanished.
“I shall try,” she said, contemplating with a little perplexity
the disarray of objects, “with these types, and with books and
labels—yes with poetry and epigrams—to set before the people a
picture, a restoration of Old Egypt. If they can be made to realize
its awful distance from our modern variegation, its monolithic
cryptic strangeness, if they can feel the breath of its exaggerated
egotism, and the weird pantheistic aspirations of its religions, or
catch in an imaginative picture its stolid immensity of architectural
violence, will that not be an education? Suppose I can draw them
along from room or hall to other rooms and halls, each one the
concentration of the idea of a peculiar culture, as the Greeks, the
Romans, the Mediaeval, the Mahommetan, the Indian and, expanding as
they move upward to our modern day, into treatment of nations or
races, as cultural units what a breadth of well defined impressions I
can make!
“I can invite them into beautiful avenues of thought, recreating by
the spell of portraiture and language these obliterated complexes
of ideation; the Egyptian aridity and monumental titanism, the art
and limpidity of Greece, the strength and legal emphasis of Rome,
and then may I not attempt somehow to show the warming power of
Christianity by which our hearts become susceptible to all beauty,
for Christianity Sir, unlocked the treasury of Sympathies we possess
with all life.”
There was something very lovely in Helen Lorimer when her
enthusiasm—always easily evoked—kindled, and the young Mayor thought
nothing in the form of lovely woman could be more captivating.
He was less attentive to her plans as he watched her, than he
was thoughtfully wondering with himself how impossible it was for
him to control his own feelings, and then again how far away from
him seemed the radiant gifted and noble woman whose voice rose
to him with a penetrating sweetness, and whose eyes met his with
challenging sincerity. Curiously he found himself retracing the steps
of his own life, so that while he listened, while he watched—and
watching loved—some hidden operative power of thought reviewed the
toiling days he had gone through, and his divided attention, like
a rider on two horses, noticed Miss Lorimer’s ideals—probably a
little vaguely—and his own struggles amid deprivations and against
obstacles—perhaps a little acutely.
He saw himself the child of humble parents—his father being a
bookkeeper and his mother a lady of simple birth—who had grown
rapidly and was devoured by a passion for place. At school he
fought with his schoolmates for the best position in the school
base-ball team, in the class room he engaged every power he possessed
of self-control to seize and hold the first place. He admitted
this superiority came easily, his lessons were quickly and well
learned, and his physical skill, the celerity of his movement,
were ungrudgingly acknowledged by less successful rivals. His
disposition—he was not embarrassed in making the confession—was
genial and loving, with traces of irritability, and though his
worsted opponents might regret their failures, somehow—if the
individual was not too cross grained and unforgiving—he could coax
them back into good humor and even make his own victory serviceable
to their needs.
But he must be on top; the rage for conquest burned fiercely in his
boyish heart, and this ambition kept him restlessly aggressive. He
bounded through the grammar school, he leaped over the grades in the
High School, as if, figuratively, he was an acrobat bursting paper
rings. Then he flashed through the City College, and his coruscating
transit remained a vivid bewilderment to the faculty and his class
mates. But he was always poor. He came home after the day’s exciting
experiences to a very simple home life, wherein the delicate and
sweet figure of his patiently toiling Mother, like a consecration,
deepened his love, and brought feverish resolves in his mind to lift
her, his father, and himself into affluence.
He had not indeed gained riches, but he had won _place_, the highest
in the city-state, and before him opened untrodden vistas of
ascending power, social and financial. After graduating from college
he studied law. His wit and energy, the tireless practice of self
imposed tasks, his utter absorption in the thing at hand, bore the
customary fruit. He won out easily, and before a bench of jurists
delivered an oration—argumentative, speculative, and didactic—on the
claims of socialism that almost brought that deliberative body to its
feet, and for an instant endangered its dignity by an irruption of
hand-clapping. His subsequent course had been persistently upward.
Prestige, reputation, employment were naturally gained. And finally
as he wished it, the offer of the nomination for governor was
tendered to him, and art and opportunity combined to seat him in the
governor’s chair.
He had done well, the rewards were not undeservingly allotted; no man
exerted more relentlessly his ability to work, or aimed higher in the
standards of excellence his ambition proposed to his skill. Yet—the
opposition is unusual—with this incessant application for success,
under the good of his own unappeasable thirst for place, he displayed
a most irrelevant modesty. It was an almost unsupportable personal
enigma. A man ruthlessly overcoming opposition, battling like a
maniac for position, and yet at the surcease of effort declining into
self-effacement. It seemed to his friends a neurological accident; it
was nervous exhaustion and they looked upon it as a dangerous symptom
of a physical decay.
As the Mayor thus mused, still retaining in his ears and mind the
lavish picture that Miss Lorimer was drawing, he felt again the
challenge to a new sort of conquest. Could he capture the heart, the
hand, of this famous woman, the soul of an aristocratic coterie—a
Hypatia indeed, upon whose shoulders dwelt the prestige of wealth and
talent, and yet one mingling her daily life with the currents of the
people’s lives in the ministrations of mercy, of education.
How amazingly acceptable to him—a man eager to disenthrall the
commonality from the sordid commonplaces of their lives, and bring to
them the assets of an intellectual endowment—was this condescension.
And yet he secretly but acutely augured that he and Miss Lorimer
were separated by a deep moral hostility. Helen Lorimer dwelt wholly
within the borders of a severe and ecstatic religious faith, and
he—Ah! how should he reconcile to her his repudiation of all creed,
the complete erasure from his heart of all faith and the bleak
hardihood of his reiterated negations before the fabric and the
vouchers of the Church?
The Mayor was enrolled among those who accept the scientific
conduct of life, who look along the years ahead of them as periods
of duration to be used discreetly, but who spurned the illusion of
any forbearance from above, any posture of agreement with a God,
any dream of perpetuation beyond the pit and doom of death. Perhaps
he felt the authority and corrective uses of the Church, but like
Napoleon who saw in the Concordat a political compact and nothing
more, he appreciated its invincible excellence as a police guarantee
for ORDER.
He could not have said with Napoleon, “I do not believe in religions,
_but in the idea of a God_;” he believed in neither. To the world
about him, to the men of daily intercourse he was reticent. He
respected the rights of conviction, and he knew their value. But with
this new aspect of life delightfully developing before him, with the
ingratiating companionship of a woman’s heart and soul, leading him
into untraversed joys—and such a woman—could there safely be long
concealment? He saw how immensely earnest she was, that perhaps she
in a measure lived for invisible realities; should he hesitate to be
frank?
Well at any rate there was now no need for brutal, disconcerting,
confessions; let Love have her perfect way at first, and let
reconcilement follow later. His present happiness was too great to
be disturbed by shocks of disagreement. He was quite ready to fight
hard for the splendid prize, and strategy—though he despised mean
motives—was a legitimate resource.
There was a short silence which might have left an unpleasant
impression upon the lady had it been continued, when the Mayor spoke;
“It is a splendid thought, but can you realize it, as you wish; can
you make these people understand? I suppose too, there is an ulterior
aim, something outside of the mere literary or poetic image of these
superseded cultures. What is that?”
“Oh, there will be much more than my museum. There will be
instructions, lectures and these must all conform to a definite
progressive training in the idea of the improved modern state over
all these decadent and vanished social states. I wish to show the
rise of the conception and the realization under our modern forms
of government of property; I want to accentuate the individualistic
idea, the definite personal progression, by which the whole community
rises to higher things, and I want to give that all a christian
imprint, because I believe that the christian formula is the only one
that fits the requirements of our day, as I believe that they have
always fitted the requirements of every day.
“The vagaries and the perplexities of men would vanish if they
could all feel—rich and poor alike—the dissolving efficacy of Love,
mutual toleration, mutual forbearance, and if too in accordance with
the hierarchical type of the Church they could feel the necessary
relations of higher and lower in the social scale. The socialists are
levellers: they would crop all men short to one height and that the
shortest; the wonderful picture of our world with its atmosphere and
relief would all become like a Chinese drawing, all foreground, out
of proportion and distorted.”
The Mayor was hearing very carefully now, and he was looking at the
speaker with a flushed face—the index of some sudden resolution—his
hands folded before him and his lips just slightly tightened—a
further assurance of a forming determination.
“It will surprise you, Miss Lorimer, but _I_ am a socialist in a way,
and perhaps you will remonstrate with me if I say that I would invoke
the traditions and the teachings of Christianity to convince you,
that you ought to be one too—_in a way_.”
The speaker was now smiling with a deferential suggestion of not
wishing to be misunderstood or rebuked. When he looked that way he
was at his best, and Helen Lorimer forsook her dogmatism and answered
back with a strange girlish sweetness and yearning; “Ah! please: You
wish to confuse me. Tell me just what you mean, and tell me too how
you can be a socialist and say the things you said to me at the City
Hall when I came to you to crave mercy for socialists. I think I can
undeceive you as to Christianity being socialistic—in your sense.”
The Mayor sat down and leaning on the arm of his chair spoke slowly,
softly, without ostentation, and with an earnestness that was the
outpouring of his deepest convictions.
“Christianity must, I think, be socialistic in all senses. What
does it pretend to be, to do? Surely it is not solely a Gospel of
Preparation, it is also a Gospel of Life; this life, this weary
work-a-day world, with its inequalities, its disrupting accidents,
its amazing wildernesses of need, of sickness, of despair, of the
manifold disorganizing vagaries of temper, and of the vast Upas Tree
of evil.
“Is it not meant to meet all that and help it? How can it be done? I
think in one way only. By preaching the essential community of all
the productive powers of the state, by helping to make society a
vast machine, if you will, running smoothly like a perfect machine,
with all its parts coordinated, adjusted, registered, inter-active,
reciprocating. Christianity should denounce the tyranny of the
individual and the individualistic conceit. Society organized
upon individualization is organized upon Greed. The principle of
individualism is the feral type, the manner of wild nature, of
preying and carnivorous appetite; it is the struggle, internecine,
sanguinary, continuing, wherein the strongest survives and it alone.
“Christianity I take you mean to assert, is a superinduced order at
war with nature, intended to overcome nature even to the extent of
exterminating its normal instincts,” the voice speaking became as
it were stealthily murmurous for an instant, and then it rose again
sonorous and persuasive.
“Can I care, can you care, can anyone care, whether an industrial
metamorphosis like this strikes at the roots of literature and
art, so long as it means redemption, elevation, and happiness for
Humanity? _The main fact about life is living._ Should we not be more
interested in making the world absolutely habitable for the millions
that are in it, than in furnishing subjects to art and letters,
because it is tragic and disappointing; full now of dark shadows and
high lights too sharply contrasted conditions, too dangerous abysses
and too risky peaks?
“Art of the kind we have known, and literature of the kind we
have read, might be discouraged in an earth absolutely at peace,
absolutely happy, absolutely comfortable, absolutely _bourgeoise_,
if you will. But perhaps some other sorts of art and writing
might appear. It is not easy to stagnate the human mind, but if
its activity depends on the misery of the human heart then let it
stagnate.
“And your Christianity, why is it not socialistic? It began so.
Your Christ, observe Miss Lorimer I will be abjectly honest, not
mine—_your_ Christ told the rich man to give all he had to the poor
and to follow him;” at these words Helen Lorimer seemed to quiver
as if with a sort of terror, still her eyes never left the speaker’s
face, and because they dwelt so courageously upon his own the speaker
surrendered himself to the sway of his impulse, without reservation,
driven on by the novel inspiration of imposing upon the splendid
being in front of him by his own indomitable frankness.
“Why can not the civilized minds of the world get together and
establish some sort of a vast homogeneity, some standards of
co-operative living, an international fusion, a set of rules
governing every aspect of life, at least so far as rules will. Let it
be a machine made society, machine run, but like a perfect machine
running smoothly with oiled parts, with certainty, and exquisitely
effective, from top to bottom clean and happy.”
The Mayor ended but Miss Lorimer continued her fixed gaze at least
for a moment longer; that ended too as she rose, withdrew a little,
passing her hands over a cleverly reconstructed mimic sphinx. The
young man’s face had resumed its paleness, but his eyes shone; their
eagerness was not unnoticed, and when Helen Lorimer after a minute’s
indecision returned, and stood near him, his expression changed from
its challenging confidence, and grew quietly grave, and then he
looked at her with a queer questioning humility:
“Do I offend you? You will not think less of me, will you, if I have
been sincere? As to your visit to the City Hall in the interest of
these unfortunate men, and my stubbornness there, that has nothing
to do with my convictions. Perhaps I have not much sympathy with the
Longtinsky type, and at any rate his ideals, if he has any, are not
mine, and Order, Security, Law must be continued at all hazards. I do
not think that chaos will form a desirable introduction to a perfect
state.”
“No indeed, Mr. Mayor,” returned Miss Lorimer, a smile struggling
upward in features that had become a little daunted and astonished
with his unexpected ardor and confession; “No. I could feel no
offense—but somehow I cannot think you are right. Society is not
mechanical; you cannot make it so. In my mind christian society is an
organization, whose life—I mean its spiritual vitality—is religion,
and let me too be frank—the religion of the Catholic Church; an
organism with parts, functions, and these of high and low degree
though all serviceable to one end—and bearing the blossom and fruit
of character.
“Perhaps you will say an organism is socialistic—that our own bodies
with their various parts are socialistic. Well—perhaps—and yet—”
the speaker reflectively looked at the Mayor with a puzzled honest
glance, which brought the pleasantest of smiles into his face, and
with a little gentle laugh he hastened to increase her confusion:
“Of course—if any living thing were not a socialistic compound, it
would fall to pieces. All of its organs must become fraternally
united, fraternally active, fraternally sound: if they compete with
each other, if they engage in self assertions of independence,
and begin a war upon each other, they are no longer fraternal but
fratricidal. Has not most society, as we read of it in history, been
just that?”
Miss Lorimer did not seem to be convinced. The problem “gave her
pause,” and the half pained, half amused indecision in her face
served naturally to make the Mayor and herself better acquainted.
Indeed it pushed them forward to a very close mental companionship.
Miss Lorimer’s brow cleared, her eyes lost their humorous dismay, she
felt the grip of argument and flung back her answer with almost a
vindictive taunt.
“But society can be social without being socialistic; individual
initiative does not forbid mutual toleration, help, recognition.
Will you kill the principle of property that it has taken so long
to form, formed too by bloodshed, heroism of all sorts, invention
and patience? The savage is a socialist, the despot is one too, and
tyrannies are socialistic. The goad to effort is the prospect of
possible possession. Your socialistic society will be a sponge, made
of innumerable identical monads, not a Ship of State moving on to new
lands, new hopes, new treasures.”
“No simile will help you,” retorted the Mayor, who was enjoying
himself, who felt the thrills of a deepening friendship with the
woman before him, deepened too by just such an amiable and thoughtful
contest, “the Ship is itself a socialistic State. Each man who is on
it has his work, his pay, and lives on the winnings of the voyage.
Socialism does not preclude promotion, nor to my mind, property, but
it greatly equalizes the chances of having anything at all for those
who to-day have nothing.
“As a child without liberty, a man, supported by his family, lives,
the imprudences or accidents of his life deprive him of support
when he becomes of age and is given liberty. Liberty to five or
six men out of ten means destruction. Let the State once become a
family, and all of its children live, for it will be a family rich
enough to support them. The best, the smartest, if you will, the
most able will control, but not altogether for themselves. They will
no longer use their wits to get the best of those around them—as
I have, as others do—for selfish reasons. They will be saved from
themselves. Greatness of character, that I know Miss Lorimer you
adore, will not be diminished because struggle—that is the hard,
sordid, internecine—conflict sort—ceases; greatness of character
will be apportioned more liberally to many. And there will be
struggle enough. No ideal state can escape it; struggle against sin,
sickness, disease, ignorance, waste, revolt, prejudice, against
storm, earthquake the viciousness of nature. Only by a process of
unification, consolidation, can the race burst its bonds, and reach
Utopia. You say, it is a dream—perhaps—but dreams have lifted men to
Heaven.”
Miss Lorimer hesitated for one instant, but a new light of
appreciation entered her face; the Mayor had won—something—and
perhaps much.
“Well, Mr. Mayor, you press it strongly, and because it now comes to
me under a different guise, let me suspend judgment. You may teach
me more—but surely individual responsibility cannot carelessly be
forgotten, and with me, back of everything is the Church. Bonald has
written that society does not consist of the walls of our houses or
the ramparts of our towns but that wherever a human being is found
there is a father, a mother, a child, a language, heaven, earth, God
and a religion.”
A shadow of pain crossed the face of the young man. He rose from his
chair, stooped towards Miss Lorimer, who had sat down and in a voice
that vibrated with a distinct suggestion of sorrow, said: “You may
teach me what you can about the Church, but to me it seems unlikely
that the Church stands so stubbornly for things as they are.”
“The Church revolutionized the world. It brought into action all
the unselfish sentiments you appeal to. The culture in sympathy it
has given to the world makes your Socialism possible. Besides” Miss
Lorimer grew more beautiful before his face, as some transfiguring
grace of Hope and Faith rested on her, and gave her an indefinable
sweetness, “the Church gazes beyond the rim of this earth. Its feet
stand on the earth but its head is above the clouds. You remember
Virgil’s image:
_Ingreditur que solo, et caput inter nubila condit?_”
The Mayor laughed, “Ah, yes, Miss Lorimer, but for most practical
purposes it is best to keep our eyes fastened on the ground. Really
star gazing seldom helps us to walk straight. But do not rebuke me, I
understand. I do indeed, and I would not do myself such harm in your
eyes as to appear to be cynical.”
A swinging window frame pushed by a softly rising breeze borne to
them from the river, swung back, and the delicious summer air,
fragrant and warm, blew in upon them, breathing its delicate febrile
sensuousness, and almost—as if a voice, by some disembodiment only
present to their interior sense, had spoken—summoning them to come
out into the night The window opened upon one of the broad balconies
which encircled the mansion at this attic story, and as they both
looked to the portal caught by a common sense of interest in the
pleasant draught of air, the moonlight also smote the floor, though
barely seen in the lighted room. It came from the full moon that now
had floated upward over Long Island, and inundated the outspread city
with a golden glow, whose burnish only rested here and there where
it was not repelled by the electric aureole below it, withdrawing
timidly from the spaces bathed in the nether glow of its terrestrial
rival.
As it happened the room in which they were, was at the north end
of the villa, and at that point occurred one of the gaps in the
artificial illumination of the city upon which, as if by its own
preemption, the disheartened moonlight still presumingly remained
unchallenged. The invitation met their wishes. This personal
collision of opinion was out of place that glorious night. The Mayor
dearly wished to have done with it, earnest as he was, and just then
his heart rebelled against this intellectual coercion. And why was it
that Helen Lorimer wistfully gazed at the shrinking intrusion of the
wisps of moonlight, and rose obediently to the same unuttered welcome
to the outer night? It was a quaint incident that they both rose and
walked toward the open window, and they both laughed a little. It
seemed to help. Louder laughter came to their ears from the river,
where flaming barges sailed with bursts of music, and waifs of
song, bewitched—however crude they were—into delightsome sound by
the melting amiable night. They could see the opposite banks of the
noble stream where the Palisades, formed then into a reservation,
showed their columnar masses weirdly glistening, for on them fell the
moonlight with the peccant light of the wavering electrical auroras.
“May we sit here?” said the Mayor.
“The night is too lovely to be missed, and this view of the valley
and those far distant Van Cortlandt towers is wonderful; it always
is. Ah, and the air boats are abroad to-night,” and the speaker
pointed upward to the arrowy trails of light, and the Mayor listened
to the hum of the aeroplanes.
The chairs were brought out by the Mayor, and the two sat down silent
for an instant, startled by the strangeness of their abandonment to
the scarcely felt intuition of a mutual recognition.
Below them shone the lamps in an oval courtyard, where sanded paths
wound about slender marble pillars, amid stunted and clipped fig
trees, where clambering eglantine masked the stone pedestals on which
the electric lights glowed, all caught in the embrace of a peristyle
whose seats also looked off to the glinting waters of the river. They
could see the outstretched roofs of the many mansions of Carrara and
flaring on the horizon many steeply rising flames of light, issuing
from the monuments in Van Cortlandt Park, like sentinels, along the
ridgy back of the Mosholu.
“The world is a task master that it is hard to please.” It was the
Mayor’s voice, and the accusing tone seemed sad with some ulterior
meaning; he continued: “I mean in all our vocations we fail to meet
expectations.”
“Because the world expects too much; it is always looking for an idol
and an ideal. We all do. It is better to be disappointed in what we
do than to be destitute of ambitions. But the end of the matter is
that this world is insufficient. It is provisional, probational, and
the prelude of completer states.
“_The flower that smiles to-day
To-morrow dies
All that we wish to stay
Tempts and then flies.
What is this world’s delight?
Lightning that mocks the night,
Brief even as bright._”
“Those are Shelley’s words,” answered the Mayor, “I know them; but
they are vitiated by an obliquity of thought. The flower that fades,
the fleeting pleasure, the thought—quick lightning, are beautiful,
_because_ they vanish, because they are the transports of a moment,
because they are figures in the shimmering flying weave of things.
It is the marvel of change that helps us to live, and it is a
progressive change, too, an eternally upward march. The vanished
delights are only replaced by better ones.”
“_So on our heels a fresh perfection treads,
A power more strong in beauty, born of us
And fated to excel us, as we pass
In glory that old darkness._
“And _with_ us, as eternal souls, the fresh perfection is Paradise or
Heaven.” Again there was a silence, and the Mayor’s face was turned
to the speaker gazing so intently with perhaps, could it have been
narrowly determined, a haunting wonder and amused delight, as if he
prized in her the power of faith, so dead in his own heart. But he
intended to concede nothing:
“The thought is pleasant, but is it true? Is it not wiser to submit
to our limitations, to bow the neck to the necessitous hardship of
our place and not too fondly dwell in dreams?”
“Our limitations are made by ourselves. There can be no necessary
limit to belief, if we will but listen.”
“Listen—listen to what?” the voice trembled a little.
“Well I will not say the Church—the Revelation—but listen to the
desires within us. Surely it is as legitimate to believe our hopes as
to set up our Despair, and worship that.”
“No,” answered the Mayor, “not Despair but Negation—and not set up as
an idol, but like an inner controlling voice—like our conscience, if
you will—whispering warnings against intoxicating fancies, against
too warm and vaporous delusions, that will make us incapable and
foolish. Let the Promethean age come, but it can only come by effort,
work, thought, not by submission to veiled and luxurious promises.”
The voice was not hard or strained, nor was there any suspicion
of defiance in it; if anything, there was in it, to the ears of
the listener—and the listener was alert, eager, yearning even—an
admonition of gentle remonstrance only.
“If Christianity does not mean effort, work, thought, I do not know
what it means; and the Promethean age, will it come on this earth,
and as we are? Can it? Does it help to murmur with the Cenci:
“_If there should be
No God, no heaven, no earth, in the void world,
The wide grey lampless deep unpeopled world?_
And are dreams so useless? In what harbor of refuge do we crave to
enter when we sleep, if it is not pleasant dreams. And is not even
sleep itself necessary? If doubt and angry questionings are to fill
our lives with turmoil, can we work at all? There must be a foothold
somewhere, somehow, a ground level where our new ambitions rise.”
“Hardly,” the Mayor answered quickly, and his voice rose with that
peculiar sweetness of tone that fell on Helen Lorimer’s ears like
music, “Work for work’s sake is ground enough; bettering conditions,
giving beauty to the world, hastening the conquest of nature,
mastering power, dispelling disease, winning knowledge, conquering
the silence and oppression of things, rising eternally to far off
dispensations of greater and greater power. Man’s ultimatum is the
world and what he can make of _it_, and _himself_.
“_The lightning is his slave; heavens utmost deep
Gives up her stars, and like a flock of sheep
They pass before his eye, are numbered, and roll on!
The tempest is his steed, he strides the air;
And the abyss shouts from her depth laid bare,
Heaven, hast thou secrets? Man unveils me; I have none._”
“And yet—there remains Death. Will you conquer Him? And Age and
Sorrow? Does Knowledge and Power mean everything, do they mean
anything without companionship and Love?” Miss Lorimer stopped,
checked by a sudden embarrassment, her words carried meanings which
stirred her blood, and her instinct told her too acutely it was for
both of them dangerous going—just there; the word she had uttered
seemed even then to her like some torch which, inconsiderately
dropped, lights the eager dry prairies when the wind is rising.
Perhaps it was such; her own heart leaped strangely, an unwonted
warmth flowed stealthily yet urgently through her body, and the
whispering summer night bore to her ears its undulous distant sounds,
as if they were faintly calling to her to follow the new summons of
a new joy, opening before her, rich, splendid, and fathomless. She
leaned on the balustrade of the balcony, and watched the sky, shamed
by some untoward concussion of her being, unknown before, discovered
in this last instant, as when a man walking in the night enters a
disk of illumination which reveals himself and his position, and
startled, he finds another step reaches a brink of peril.
And what were these serious words that came now to her ears, moving
faster and faster, breathed, she seemed to feel, almost upon her
cheeks, eloquent with conviction; prayers they were—and such
prayers!—not as she knew them in her Church—tapers of devotion—but
prayers from an adoring man’s heart, that smote her own as caresses;
how willingly she let them enter there, where she stored all her
aspirations, secret treasures of affection, and her own best
resolves!
And now when they were in, how proud they grew, holding that inner
citadel of her own as theirs and staunchly possessing the whole
place! But this was surrender—she must eject them, push them out from
those uninvaded precincts, and close the doors again, or else—Oh how
desolating it was to have those wicked prayers within, believing
themselves welcome, and acting so importunately the parts of welcomed
guests. Oh for some stalwart hand to rid her of them, to send them
backward, stumbling backward, unrewarded, repelled, killed—No! No!
not killed; that were inhuman; just ordered off and out Forever?
Ah, well, let them stand off awhile. This haste is insolence, worse,
ingratitude; let these clustering rampant prayers become more
formal, more respectful, less rapacious with their stormy signals
and provocations. There must be decorum, a slow approach, the signs
of parley and convention. These prayers are blatant, blustering,
overbearing; they have entered an open door and—now—once in, they
will not out. Oh, God!—they are indeed too cruel!
Her Pride, that glorious mistress of her heart tells them to
leave, and they do not stir. They taunt her, they seize her, tie
her chaste hands—Merciful Heavens must it be so!—and throw _her_
out, and then—these perfidious demons!—smile at their conquest,
dry their beseeching eyes, and inhabit unmoved that dear shrine of
her soul wherein she thought no steps should ever tread but those
of Memory and Faith. Has it been made so rare and lovely for this
profanation—Oh, Mother of Sorrows hear;—and Helen Lorimer’s head sank
upon her arms, on the stone railing, and she sobbed, and in her sobs
the prayers still repeated themselves, and now stood like pitiful
supplicants—no longer bold or careless—and she put her hands forward
to them, and pressed them to her breast. Suddenly they all were dear
to her; she would not have lost one! No, they should not go; the
place was theirs; her heart received them, and kept them. And these
were the prayers.
“Yes, Love and Companionship, those accompany the best effort. They
are the linked comrades who hold up the arms while the battle rages,
who press to our lips the chalice which feeds our strength, who
fold us in their arms when the victory is won and who bring sleep
to our wearied brain. Oh, have I not yearned for that shelter and
encouragement! But neither Church nor Religion could bring to me that
aid. Pardon me Miss Lorimer, but the empty voices of a Church, or the
old reiterations of a creed are not the Love nor the Companionship a
man craves; Oh, something much nearer the inmost inscrutable needs of
his nature. Surely your own heart tells you and if—no restraint can
withhold this confession Miss Lorimer—I tell you now that I love you,
that I have with a fixed unswerving, tireless determination, meant
to say this all to you. It is an effrontery for me to speak now,
but you touched the overflowing stream of feeling, and it has burst
its bounds. Do not disdain me for it; do not let this error, this
rashness, foil or hurt me in your approval.
“I beg you to listen, to let the open chance be mine to win you, to
forgive this advantage of opportunity I have taken. Hear my promises.
I will not molest you; I will prove my love; I will be patient if you
can be. You turn away. Are you astonished? Do you feel resentment? Oh
say that you do not. Say that I am forgiven, that you will let me see
you often. It is a priceless boon for me to know you. The thought of
you has grown daily in my mind, until it has become an overmastering
desire and adoration. I have lived a barren and struggling life among
men, cut off by the relentless pressure of work from the priceless
joys of womanly culture. And yet I do not know that matters now. I
rejoice that it has been so, for as you have entered my life you come
with all the more abounding blessedness of promises, I have until
this moment, never dreamed of.
“Speak to me one word—just this—that this sudden loss of restraint
is forgiven. I do not know, I did not dream—that I would be so
hopelessly swept off my feet. I meant no harm, by every throb of my
poor bewildered heart I meant none. Miss Lorimer, I love you, and
though that love were born but yesterday, a century would not make it
greater. Do you despise me because I cannot believe as you believe?
I know that you honor candor, just common honesty—no soul so upright
as yours could do otherwise—and I have been candid. Does that seem
wrong? I am willing to learn all things. Let me learn from you.”
The head of the sobbing woman before him was raised, its tears were
wiped away and the figure that bore it rose, and then the eyes—those
wondrous, burning, searching, welcoming eyes—were turned to his, and
on that face was born—as if from the enchantment of his own words—a
smile, and somehow the young man knew that it was the gesture of
permission, and he bowed before the splendor of that beauty, while
his heart stood still, engulfed in its own unutterable hopes.
CHAPTER VIII
THE CHARIOT OF FLIGHT
Tom Ratler had prospered. He was in favor with God and man. The Mayor
liked him. Mr. Briggs, the Mayor’s secretary liked him, especially
well, he was so attentive to that gentleman’s social monologues,
and his graphic pictures of coming crises. His uninterrupted assent
to all Mr. Briggs predicted gave him an enviable preferment, and
Mr. Briggs’ own pugnacious instincts, and his muscular prowess
made him a natural admirer of Tom’s fine physique, and his manly
courage and aplomb. Tom understood most of Mr. Briggs’ discourses,
but his apparent acquiescence sprang less from endorsement,
than indifference, and his sense of obligation. He was indeed
impressed favorably by much of Mr. Briggs’ talk, lately, since his
ravished eyes had fallen on the pleasant face and alluring form
of Jessie Longtinsky, whose enforced—as he fondly was pleased to
think—imprisonment, amid the murky, cloudy and black walls of a
murder-breathing, dark, conniving, and impious nihilism, made him
more and more anxious for the opportunity of freeing her, and placing
her more conveniently near himself.
And among Tom’s friends and patrons none exceeded in admiration the
Mayor’s mother. Her benignant eyes shone upon him through her bright
spectacles, almost with the fondness of his own dear mother’s, and he
became so assiduous, painstaking, and thoughtful, over her comfort
and safety in the big family auto, that the old lady experienced
a wonderful happiness in seeing him, and being with him; his
cheerful ringing voice brought gladness to her heart, and amid the
growing evils of the day—for Mrs. Benziger was one of Mr. Briggs’
sympathetic listeners—she felt that her son had a good strong bulwark
of defense in Tom, when the dark hour came, when, as Mr. Briggs had
often told her, “the streets of the city would be filled with the
cries and shot of an intestinal conflict.”
Tom Ratler had frankly admitted to his friend, Ned Links, that he
was mortally wounded, that he was in love with a “fairy” on the
East Side, and that happiness for him could only be attained by
the undivided possession of the beautiful darling, whom he must
and would capture. He did not tell his companion that he had met
her—this disturbing vision—quite frequently, that the passion had
been mutual, and that the accidental glance up to her at the window
of her home and her own appreciative view of himself, had conspired
into a complete reciprocity, and that the heart struggles of the
two partners to the contract, had been of the most excruciating and
distinctively exciting sort. To be sure, Tom was hilariously certain
that Jessie Longtinsky would be his; his mind leaped over obstacles
and his heart thoroughly approved its confidence, but to the tender
and filial soul of Jessie, the way ahead of them was dark with
parental objections, and the more deadly and hideous shadow of the
ravening jealousy of her lover Poniatowsky.
Tom had been made, by the exigencies of his own love, the most alert
and subtle sort of a detective, and when he and Mr. Briggs left
off their surveillance of the editorial chambers of The Beehive,
Tom nightly watched it, and thus discovered the new retreat of the
paper, and his idol. Love’s ingenuity had not lost any of its skill
in eluding detection or detention in the year 2000, and Jessica
was not more willing to meet Lorenzo, than Jessie, in spite of all
her maidenly terrors and shrinkings, was happy over the thought of
seeing Tom. For she truly loved him. He suddenly seemed to her the
impersonation of all the bright and happy things a man may be to a
woman, and she was, without any doubt, to Tom, the “best ever.”
So their meetings had been as numerous as they could make them, and
Tom was rapidly forming plans for doing away with them altogether
by marrying Jessie. These hopes Jessie deprecated because of
Poniatowsky. She hoped that Poniatowsky would be called away on
some errand of her father’s, or in some way disappear. And yet she
admitted to herself, that the man was fiercely enamored of her. She
trembled to think of his rage should he find out the true state of
things between her and Tom. He had apparently forgotten his first
suspicions in that regard, and although he fretted and grew moody
over Jessie’s coldness, he was successfully deceived by the lovers as
to their meetings. Jessie in her household duties found it necessary
to market for the house on the west side of the city, and here, away
from observation of her own people, her neighbors, and the prowling
steps of her father’s confederates, she saw Tom, and as they agreed
to meet very early in the mornings, nothing happened as yet either
in Tom’s work, or the meddlesome gossip of her friends, to interfere
with these sweet engagements.
Now it had come to pass that Ned Links had deserted his
employment—lucrative at it was—in the Suicidarium, and the buxom and
languorous lady whom Tom had first met there as one of the visualized
angels of the future world, to which the suicides were directed, had
deserted her employment at the same place. Ned had done this, through
Tom’s own disgust with the business, and because Tom had discovered
for him an extraordinary opportunity as the motorist of a dirigible
balloon. It had become in New York, at that distant time, a summer
sport to traverse the skies at night with illuminated balloons. On
the most auspicious evenings the spectacle thus created in the air
was extraordinary, and the elements of a new expensive entertainment
added another wonderment to the extravagance and exhilaration of the
city’s tempestuous life. Many of these balloons were used by the
public, and what were termed “aeronauticals,” were popular excursions
through the atmospheric regions over the city, and the surrounding
country. The balloons could be hired, carrying parties of not more
than six, and they were taken at stations called “levitories.” These
were large—usually square—enclosures, in which the balloons were
stalled. Here they were inflated, repaired, and prepared for use.
They were known also as Zeppelins, from the count of that name who
had in Germany, at the beginning of the twentieth century, made
his excursion in the air in this manner. An attached car suspended
behind the operator of the balloon (himself in the elevated “pilot”)
accommodated the travellers, an apparatus of revolving fans propelled
it, and a steering gear of simple efficacy turned and wheeled it
through the invisible thoroughfares of the air.
The happy chance came when Ned was able to invite his friend Tom to
take one of these aerial trips and to both the young men the thought
came instantly that the trip would be of incomparable charm if the
ladies of their hearts accompanied them. Thus alone, in the circling
heights of the star covered sky, their loves would take new delights.
It certainly was a pretty thought, and Tom pronounced it “stunning,”
which gave Ned much pleasure as he had an immeasurable estimate of
Tom’s opinion, and he knew that Tom had repulsed him after that
dreadful night at the Suicidarium. So it was done. Ned got the
permission to use one of the balloons at the “Zeppelin” to which he
was attached, and the time was settled, and Tom, after much timorous
reproaches from Jessie, and a sinking in her heart that it would
somehow turn out badly made the appointment. Miss Delia Mutchler
was a bit frightened at the thought, but quite incompetent to think
of anything else for weeks, and uttered such ecstatic tributes to
Ned’s generosity and goodness that that overjoyed gentleman found
it necessary to relieve his feelings by pointing out the fact that
his wages would permit them to be married sooner than had seemed
reasonable. And then he surrendered himself to such a masterful
exhibition of osculation as to extort from the usually insatiable
Delia the remark;
“Neddy you’re just a kissing machine, and it’s not me that’s going to
have my mouth blistered with your smacks;” and then, as the wrathful
Neddy started to his feet: “Well, a dozen more Neddy for good
measure, and I’ll not miss them, dearest.”
The party made their _rendez-vous_ at a Zeppelin in the Bronx, not
far from the edge of the Zoological Park. The little group stared
a few moments at the brick walls of the balloon-house. Gas jets,
stuck out of its walls, vaguely illuminated its leviathan size, but
some three stories above they descried the huge iron and wooden
doors which sloped together like a roof, when closed, opening by
counter weights, running on steel columns outside, a curious grim
construction which made Jessie shudder a little, as she drew Tom’s
arm closer to her side, and gave the nonchalant Delia a squeamish
feeling of a difficult adventure. As they came round to the front
entrance of the “barn,” a swirling humming noise, a throbbing
methodical rhythm, as of beating fans, struck their ears, and the
light from within flamed through the crevices of the doorway, and
through the two windows in front, and the peering visitors saw the
inner rooms filled with moving figures, while a voice giving orders,
elicited various responses among them as they here and there adjusted
ropes, wires, and rods.
The light within the enclosure came from hissing flaring gas flames,
and this light, almost all placed below, threw upward a pale
penumbral illumination over the enormous shape above, swaying heavily
with an imminent expression of suddenly losing patience, and freeing
itself with a monstrous spasm to leap to its wide home in the skies.
It was an enormous bulk; depending cables of rope and rods of steel
held two platforms, one arranged like a cushioned box, the other
holding the chair of the operator. Its monstrous size resembled some
colossal cigar, and around it, clasping it like giant bracelets
were five rings of electric lamps. Above and below the slopes which
defined its forward and backwards ends, were also placed four strong
lamps with reflectors. All of these lamps were fed from an electric
battery on the operator’s platform, and could be turned off and
on, with the lever of a switch. Thus designed the aerial boat swam
in the atmosphere like a shooting column of light, some translated
phosphorescent ascidian from the deep, and, when the lights on
some fabrics were variegated in colors, the strange shimmering and
scudding object, in the night, became a fantastic whisking prism.
None of these lamps were illuminated as the friends entered the
doorway, and the whole mass over their heads, inertly slumberous and
yet stirring with wheezing oscillations, looked dark and dangerous.
Ned had made arrangements for the service of an operator so that he
and Tom and their companions might enjoy uninterruptedly the pleasant
frolic. Everything was in readiness, the balloon filled, the fans
in working order, while the dead still night auspiciously augured a
successful trip. The balloon was released, slightly slipping upward
along steel guides with a rasping groan, and the passenger car was
attached, the operator took his place, and the party of merry-makers,
with little shrieks from Delia, and subdued exclamations of wonder
from Jessie gathered quickly in the comfortable roofless car with
its windowed sides, while almost at the same moment with a few gaspy
creaks the whole monster rose softly, and like a cloud was lifted
above the barn, through the wide open roof, and floated like a
gigantic thistle down into the amazing beauty of the night.
How wonderful it was; Suddenly the lamps upon the great drum over
their heads flashed upon the eyes of the voyagers, a shrill piping
whistle announced the flight, and upward with broad curves, swinging
right and left, the machine accomplished its magic circuit through
the sky. Higher and higher, the delicious warm air fanning their
cheeks, the infinite delicate splendor of the city beneath them,
and far and far away the veiled country-sides sprinkled and pricked
with lights. It was like passing into a world of unearthly things,
and the charmed Jessie and stunned Delia with Tom—the affair was
not so uncommon to Ned—were silenced into admiration of the strange
experience.
And, as they turned from side to side, watching the shifting features
below them, darts of moving lights swept from the same earth,
announcing the arrival into the fields of the air of new phantoms
like themselves. These increased in numbers. The time was propitious,
and ascending from the nether shades, like immense glowing insects
the luminous bodies stole in from all quarters crossing and
recrossing, dipping and bending, swooping here with awful speed, and
there as if becalmed, swept by the mild currents of the atmosphere,
alone, when, as it often happened, songs and music issued from the
balancing cars until—it seemed so to Jessie and Tom—they had become a
part of some heavenly realm.
For some time they kept in with the sporting crowd of vessels,
sailing up and down over the spread chromosphere of the great city so
far below. They slid upward upon invisible runners far aloft, then
turned and launched backward, and down, with such impetuosity as to
draw from the girls faint cries, and a whistling wonder from the lips
of Tom.
It had grown to be July since Tom had reached New York, and the
nights were warm, though in the serene upper airs with salty
emanations from the sea sweeping over them the temperature was soft
and cooling, and—here was the wonder of it—it was the glorious
Fourth. It was amazing to note the city like a curdled pond of light
with disks, streams, undulations, spots, and dark clots in it. If
they approached it nearer a faint hum came to their ears; when they
rose high the antennae of lights stretched indefinitely off in skeins
of lines and braids. Now and then they caught the roar of an earth
train of cars, sometimes the chirp of a bird passed them in the sky,
and sometimes they ran through a cloud of insects. The wonderful
instrument obeyed every whim of its pilot, and followed the aerial
heights and depths as a ship rises and falls on the liquid hills of
the ocean.
The new moon blinked at them when they first started out, and it
somehow seemed a companion in the clouds, its golden crescent leaving
them at last over the vaporous edge of the swinging earth. They
mounted higher, and they shivered with a strange cosmic cold, the
tiny pavement of cirrus dipped cloudlets seemed just above them, and
the weirdness kept them still with amazement.
They all laughed when Jessie whispered; “Don’t let us leave the earth
yet,” and Tom swept her a little closer to himself and told her, “It
wouldn’t matter where they went as long as SHE was with them, and he
guessed it might be a little safer for both of them, if he and she
started out for another star,” which allusion to Poniatowsky brought
Jessie’s cheeks nearer to Tom, and then their lips touched, in which
mutual consolation they both attained a philosophic indifference to
Fate.
“Lor! But this is dandy,” exclaimed the suppressed Delia at length,
“Those scoops at Coney, and the Ferris Wheel aren’t in it. It sorter
makes my head go round and it’s just shivering cold,” to which
complaint Ned resorted to such readjustments of his arms as might
correct this inconvenience.
Again they fled from these heights to the warmer zones, and again
skimmed over the broad city, that bubbled below, and now, in the
darkening night began its wondrous celebration of the nation’s birth
day. Along the lines of increasing splendor, in all its functions,
the great city in the year 2000, had developed a regard for the
spectacular possibilities of the Fourth that made that day the climax
of the year’s shows. A southern temperament had stolen into the
city’s blood. It was hard to say exactly how it happened, unless
the settlement of French, and the expanding influence of the Italian
fusions, had effected it, but in all things artistic and ceremonial,
this American city attained vaster designs of beauty. Even the _Mardi
Gras_ had started its grotesque and glittering processions within New
York. Some affirmed that the milder climate had aided the aesthetic
regeneration, and others ruefully regretted a change, which began to
put on the city the semblance of an extravagant dissipation.
The exaltation of the Fourth began about the middle of the century,
about 1950, when it was proposed to give it a new official dignity
in the calendar of the city’s holidays. It was felt by some agitated
patriots that the great anniversary grew clouded in its meaning, that
the sense of it could be supremely accentuated by taking advantage of
the growing instincts for display, and making of the day a memorable
splash of splendor in the year. Subscriptions were opened, throughout
the year, and the money thus given with a liberal largess from the
city’s treasury, was devoted to the placement of marvellous firework
exhibitions. The occasion was really remarkable. Night and day were
given over to its celebration. A gorgeous procession filled up the
forenoon of the day; at noon the bands of the city played at all
available points for two hours; then succeeded a free performance at
the theatres of a play, usually patriotic, or quite as frequently
classic and elevating, some Shakespearean drama being performed
at the enormous auditorium built by the city for free educational
drama. And at night, after a furious cannonading, at nine o’clock the
pyrotechnic ebullition began.
The growing habit of “ballooning” made the precautions necessary, to
regulate, on the night of the Fourth of July, these aerial revellers,
and so a certain time was instituted for the beginning of the show.
All private pyrotechnics were discouraged or forbidden, and the
city turned out at night, the crowds threading their ways to the
point of display. The regulations for the balloons were for them to
remain at the elevation of one thousand feet, or to congregate over
the centre of the city, for the firework stands were placed around
the city, further towards its confines, and here they were set off
from tall towers. This permitted the air voyagers the advantage of
centering their barks over the centre of the city from which view
point the splendor of the spectacle grew enormously. The picture
above, below, was one of festal power. The city was illuminated,
the bells of the churches were rung in chimes at seven, the shining
balloons congregated over the central parts of the city, or far
above the range of rockets and starry exploding bombs, and at nine
of the evening, began the stupendous assault upon the skies, of
the ascending battalions of terrestrial meteors. The affair became
noteworthy throughout the country, and although imitated in many of
the larger cities, the New York outburst easily excelled the rest.
Strangers poured into the city, and the bonifaces of the metropolis
found it profitable for them to swell with liberal donations the
public funds for this dazzling function.
Ned Link’s party, in the midst of congregated equipages, was
floating, immobile, over the great middle districts of the city,
waiting for the imminent splendors that would soon terminate the
inordinate and ambitious day. A shout from the aerial sightseers
announced the first glimmerings of blue stars, rising into the
skies about the edges of the huge town. They sprouted up around the
cliffy congeries of buildings. For once the electric fervor in the
air died out, and the propitious suppression allowed the power of
the fireworks full sway. The blue stars crept higher, higher; they
fenced the horizon with spouting, azure, soaring, and eclipsing
flashes. It seemed as if the voyagers were enclosed in some enchanted
and deepening circle of light. Then suddenly above these first
reconnaissances of fire, rose swiftly, and with firm gushes of
spreading flakes of color, the sheaves of sky-rockets. They made a
higher fence than the first blue stars, and set in the dark sky a
tiara of thickly sprinkled jewels, borne like a crown by the imposing
and noble city. These flaming messengers dashed upon the blackness
of the night, the faint hiss of their ascent just heard, while, with
wayward and ever graceful vagaries of motion the speeding sparks shot
outward, mingling in chains of dropping, glowing, ashes.
The rocking flotilla in the summer air was encircled by the spouting
fires. Ever and anon some audacious blade of light seemed to hover
over them, and the descending sparks of the wooden bolt which had
risen with the rocket fell among them. Then there was a little
fright, and scared cries came from here and there to be succeeded the
next moments by shouts and exclamations of wonder, as fresh climbing
ladders of flame rose in the air. The third and most marvellous
stage of the show was reached when the enchanted margins of the wide
circle below them sent up the whizzing, whistling, bursting bombs.
The zenith seemed to rain stars, the pale orbs of the heavens were
extinguished, and a carpet of mixed lights was spread through the
sky, into which with sudden coruscations, at regular intervals,
sprang a sun-like meteor which scattered far and wide golden jets,
shafts of fiery fury that sped hither and thither eclipsing all their
colored companions, and looking like improvised suns, or perhaps
monstrous unfolding chrysanthemums of light, their sinuous petals
ejected from their centres, in writhing lines, each ended with a ball
of intenser gold.
Cheers broke from the hitherto stilled audience in the air, and it
was reechoed from the earth, where thousands stood in the blackness
far underneath; it seemed as if some elemental stage of creation
was going on around them, or as if the ruptured earth was vomiting
its interior fires upward from its burning depths, and they stayed
within the centre of its belching energy. It was indeed altogether
wonderful, and Tom and Jessie felt its scenic majesty, while the
less responsible Delia and the idle-hearted Ned, spent themselves
in gurgles and exclamations. Suddenly again it was inky black about
them; not a spark lingered in the tired air. It was the theatrical
prelude to the last astonishment. The dead silence accorded with the
emptiness of sky, and then without announcement, without sound, there
stole upward from the towers, the shrubby Bengal lights, blue, green,
and red, like funeral pyres on the horizon. They sprouted and fumed,
and cast a strange reverberant patchwork of colors on the black
background, and then behind them, so it seemed, a higher erection of
pale purple lights strove outward like quickening ghosts, speeding
high, quivering and falling down, towering at this point, and anon
declining into fringes of light simply. Then came a wizard mixture
of bombs and rockets, and weird shrieking sticks of flame, the whole
medley in flowery confusion embroidering the sky with arabesques and
patterns, and then the hastened climax ended all. The bridges of
the city crossing the enclosing channels of the Hudson and the East
river flashed into sight as pendulous girdles of flickering, dancing,
mobile gold. It was most superb. The transporting beauty of it, the
sudden elation of it, the compelling splendor and the fairy opulence!
Beneath its radiance the city shone, its multiplied structure rose
startlingly, its serrations along the edges looked like huge saw
teeth, and the reflecting roofs glistened liquidly, while, as the
illumination died away, with hiss and smoke and the wafted smells of
powder filled the air, the electric lights slowly raised their heads,
as it were, again, and the penumbral glows succeeded, and the great
display was a memory.
The aerial equipages moved away this way and that, their resuscitated
lamps gleaming as they scattered off like gigantic fire-flies, most
of them descending to the earth, and some bent on a night’s sport,
soaring up, while numbers from surrounding towns shot hither and
thither, back to their resting places in New Jersey, Connecticut, and
the north. A few distant lightning flashes shown on the gathered
clouds, and faint low rumbles told of thickening thunder storms.
“What do you say to a run to the end of the island—I mean Long
Island—then a dip out to sea, and back again by the Narrows. It’s a
good night and our lunch baskets are full?” It was Ned’s voice that
made the proposal and there was an instant’s silence. It appeared too
risky. The man at the motor yelled something back to them that he
would take them home if they wanted to return, or would he turn the
ship and give them a longer sail?
“Come,” reiterated Ned, “it’s a splendid night and so still and
then—the girls;” but it was just the girls who were driven into sharp
spasms over the novelty of doing it. Jessie was really anxious about
going back, and Delia was frankly frightened. Ned had telephoned back
to the man, and the balloon was headed for the Sound. It sailed low
and the steamers could be made out as streaks of light on the sooty
waters. The motion was delightful, the spread world, over which their
winnowing way like a bird’s flight led, was specked with villages
and towns and—well the expostulations were overcome; Tom promised it
would be “all right,” and Ned soothed Delia into a charmed consent.
Away they went, the churning fans shot them on, and the sea air soon
blew in their faces. The outlying edges of Brooklyn were being left,
and the spangled ground, diapered with lamps, caught up into clots
and then spilled over the flat plane in twinkling lines, came into
view indistinctly, for they were flying low. A moan and the machine
with a half sickening dip swept upward, and the air grew chillier,
the stars came nearer, and far away on the dark rim of the world
sheet lightnings played again, and a rattle in the rigging of the
boat, was premonitory of a coming squall, perhaps, though Ned said;
“Humbug! no storm to-night. Anyhow we can beat round the island, and
win out at the start, before the wind stirs a ripple on the ocean.”
He called again to the sky skipper, and the scudding fans took on
a swifter motion, as a slight droning hum broke out from them, and
with a start the ship scudded like some fleeing bird over the land,
past Hempstead plains, a little web of light, past the wrinkled
shores of Northport, on—, on—, over the spark dotted outlines of Lake
Ronkonkoma, and swerving again to the hoarse shores over Patchogue,
to domiciled Moriches, over Eastport and West Hampton, with midnight
ringing out from its tall steeples; closer to the ground by the
Shinnecock Hills, where the roosters sent up to them their morning
cheer; again across the island to Orient, sleeping in the dark with a
returning dash on the wings of the wind to Riverhead, where Chalmers
lived and died; again with a turn that made their heads spin across
Peconic Bay, over Shelter Island and Sag Harbor to East Hampton, and
Amagansett, yet dreaming on its watery hills, the rest and haven of
artists, and then, with a tearing gait that made the machinery rip
and whistle, and shook them as they dashed against the inrushing
winds, to Montauk Point, where wharves, lined in lights, told the
sharp story of change, for now the steamers from Europe made this
their “touchdown,” and the emigrant and tourist was whisked across
Long Island to New York.
It was time to turn back, it was no longer certain that the night
would remain clear; the rumblings had increased, and from the caverns
of the east and south sprang forks of lightning. The girls were now a
little appalled, and Tom felt that they must make a run for it. Ned
told the driver to keep out to sea, and along the shore, and with the
wind behind them they went forward furiously.
But, quicker than they, came the hurrying storm, and the piled
clouds seemed to stand in their way like black buttresses, spitting
fire. The gloom encircled them; they suddenly tossed and spun like
a top in a whirlpool of currents. There was consternation, and, for
a moment only, indecision, then Ned roared through the “phone” to
lighten up and ascend, and the next instant with wheeze and crack,
the gray hulk pushed upward through what seemed a sort of atmospheric
funnel, while buffeting winds slapped the voyagers in the face, and
the rocking balloon, pitched hither and thither, sometimes actually
whirled around in circles, that threatened to rupture and destroy
her. But with a sort of obstinate energy it pushed its way through
seething clouds, amid a crashing report of thunder and the tracery
gleamings of lightning.
The rain splashed upon them in bucketfulls, and plugs on the floor
of the basket were removed to let the deluge escape; but the ascent
continued, while the little party crouched and clung together in a
very real terror. At a moment when deliverance seemed impossible, and
the darkness closed in upon them closer, while the billows of air
spun their craft around and jerked it here and there, and the ominous
chafing of the cables promised some sudden separation of the wheeling
and shivering carriage in which they rode, and a stern chilling frost
made itself felt in the rattling hail—at that very moment, when Tom’s
stout heart quailed, and the girls had fainted, and Ned clung to the
reeling seats, the nose of the ship issued into ether above all the
disturbance, and the staunch vehicle floated again on even keel in a
splendid radiance of stars. It was a miracle of change. They looked
down upon a surface like the surges of an angry ocean, a vortex of
colliding vapors, rent with seams of light, and belching thunders.
The stunned travellers aroused themselves, and Tom and Ned set about
resuscitating their frightened friends, when suddenly a heavy dark
object shot to their feet, and on the floor of the cage they saw
with horror, the crimped and curled form of the stricken pilot of
the balloon. They had almost forgotten him in their own excitement,
although Ned had noticed that he was swaying at his post. He might
indeed have missed falling on the lower compartment, and dropped
instead plump to the earth, had not a tilted position of the balloon
actually brought him above the under car. There he lay unconscious.
It was a desperate position, the soaring machine unguided, forcing
its way on undirected, and the man at their feet who had controlled
its wheel, tossed from his seat, overcome and possibly dying. A cry
broke from the terror stricken group.
Ned cast a sharp glance overhead, and saw that the platform of the
pilot was unharmed. _But it was empty._ Could he reach it? Tom bent
over the unconscious motorist and found him injured, but alive. He
moaned in pain and cried out as his limp form was moved. It was too
evident that some bones were broken, and Tom seized some of the
blankets and rugs, made an improvised bed, and then gave the sinking
man some of the wine they had fortunately provided themselves with,
as Ned knew the cold they might encounter.
All were now startled into attention by their singular predicament
and all looked to Ned for the next move. They were not long left
in doubt as to his intentions. He told them he must ascend to the
deserted platform. It was a hard, it seemed an impossible attempt,
but there was nothing else for it. As it was, they were drifting on a
pathless ocean, and actually headed away from the mainland. Tom and
Ned both knew the situation meant their eventual destruction, and
both grew pale with dread, and the poor women strained every nerve to
keep their consciousness.
Could he climb to the deserted seat by the cables and attachments of
the car? The conditions were favorable. The air was quiet, and the
unjostled framework permitted perhaps the dangerous enterprise. And
yet—there appeared to be one chance. The travelling car was swung
on chains from the central body of the balloon, and quite detached
from the platform of the pilot, that occupied a forward place, and
was itself fastened by iron rods to the gas-tank. There was but one
connection from the car to the steering platform, and that hardly
promised assistance. It was the chain that carried the telephone
wire from one to the other. The chain was moderately stout. It looked
serviceable; but was it? It could be tested. Then one other thought
suggested itself to the anxious scrutiny of Ned, standing stiffly
there in the strange exigency of a peril that was to him much more
like death than the painted shows which he had watched, wherein
indeed so many foolish hearts had quit the world.
This other way of possible rescue was to creep up along the heavier
cables holding the car, to the body of the equipage, insert himself
among the binding cordage around the cylinder of the balloon, twist
somehow through them to the part of the body immediately over the
platform, and drop there to the pilot. There was his own strength and
skill to be considered, and the measure of both required by the two
methods. This gave him pause, and Tom quickly realized the dilemma,
and estimated the balancing possibilities.
Both men strained their eyes to follow the chain up to its fastenings
on the platform, but into the darkness the links of steel slipped
away, and they could not see their continuity more than a few feet.
“Let’s pull it, and find out how it holds,” whispered Tom, and the
women stood up behind them listening too, and watching with blanched
faces. For them the ordeal was breaking, but while Delia moaned,
Jessie was silent. Tom and Ned pulled, at first easily, and then more
strongly, until they pressed almost their full strength on the chain.
It held. Ned was the first to speak;
“Yes. This is the way. I’ll try it Tom. It’s this or nothing. All the
control is up on that platform, and we can do nothing here. Give me a
drink and up I go and—Goodbye.”
The whisky flask was produced, and Ned took a fillip, but he had
scarcely handed the glass back to Tom, when the motionless figure of
the man at their feet stirred, and a voice spoke;
“Play out the chain its whole length, and slip off the edge of the
car; let one man hold the slack, and then you’ll get a straight pull
and go up hand over hand to the pilot. The chain will stand it. I
know,” and with a groan the voice ceased, and Tom and Ned without
looking at the sufferer, prepared to obey his instructions. First
Tom rubbed Ned’s hands until they burned; Ned in spite of the cold,
stripped off his coat, but underneath was a cardigan, which might
suffice to keep out the creeping chill. Tom told the girls to take
their seats, and then he opened the door of one side of the enclosing
framework of the car, and Ned seized the coiled chain at a sufficient
distance to allow him to drop about vertically underneath the pilot
while Tom caught the links beyond him, and they approached to the
dreadful edge of the softly swaying car. No word was spoken, and Ned
hung his legs off into space, slowly moving outward while Tom firmly
held the chain, and so lowered him. It was well done, and Ned hanging
in mid-air seemed like a long plumb-bob, just faintly visible. Then
the voice spoke again, the voice of the maimed man on the floor;
“You can touch up those lights from the car. There’s a wire at
this end of the car, that is tied to the lever of the switch. That
will give you more light. I turned them off when the squall struck
us.” But Tom was afraid to move to do this. The sudden afflux of
light where all had been previously half dark might so startle the
suspended man, that he would lose his steadfastness and fall. And
yet Tom felt the value of the suggestion, as the light flowing down
from the lamps above, would give Ned courage, and make the task less
awful, besides the material benefit of showing him better what he
was doing. Wavering for an instant as to what he should do, his ears
heard Ned’s voice calling him to him; “Pull me back! back! quick!”
Tom caught the chain, and gently, without any shock, hauled Ned back
to the car, on which the brave boy scrambled.
“What was it?” asked the wondering Tom.
“It’s too cold for my fingers. They’ll stiffen and drop me. The chain
is like ice. You’ve got some gloves here, cut off the fingers, and
put them on mine. All I want is the tips. My hand is good for the
job.”
Tom had a pair of old kid gloves in his pocket, and these were
quickly cut and fixed upon the ends of Ned’s fingers, and once again
the two approached to the edge of the car, and Ned prepared to
launch himself into the darkling air. But before this Tom had told
him of the communication of the wire to the lever of the lamps, and
Ned assented to have it pulled. The test was made, and indeed the
circle of lights above, on the lower sides of the great body of the
balloon, flashed into action, and the descending light softly bathed
the anxious group, and glinted on the hanging chain, and lost itself
in the dark abysses below, where yet the reverberations of the storm
lingered, and the shattered clouds pulsated with occasional strokes
of lightning.
Ned slid off, slowly allowed by Tom to reach a straight position
under the pilot and when this was done, the pull up began, and hand
over hand he ascended. Tom watched him with his heart in his mouth,
but with such a glow of delight in his splendid courage! Up—up—he
went. He was nearing the pilot and Tom could scarcely keep his voice,
it seemed so certain he would reach it, and succeed. But, no! he
stopped, and Tom could see that Ned had raised his head, Oh! so very
slowly—and peeked over to the platform, almost on the level of his
face; Tom thought he heard a cry, and then—my God!—the chain fell,
past him, its end dangling in the fathomless atmosphere, while its
weight dragging on the unspent portion in the car rattled the links
about Tom’s feet.
Tom’s eyes had followed the chain in its fall, but though he peered
over the sickening side below him, in the cones of light thrown by
the electric lamps, he caught no sight of the hurled body of his
companion. Had Ned been able to have held on to the chain, the
flight downward and the sharp arrest at its end would have wrenched
him away and shot him pitilessly to the earth. Tom dreaded to raise
his head, for one moment he pressed his hands over his face, and a
queer tearing shiver passed through his body, and then—
In that moment the girls had gathered about Tom. They had understood
the attempt Ned was to make, and instead now of crouching against
each other in a sort of swooning, convulsed embrace, they had watched
with eager strained eyes the whole effort. They had seen the loosened
chain, the cautiously disappearing body of their friend over the
boarded margin of the car, they had even held their gaze fixed upon
Ned there in the cold boundless air, and had followed him inch by
inch as he rose above them towards that haven of safely—the pilot.
Nor were they the only watchers. The poor fellow who had felt the
slip, as of a push to eternity, from his high perch, he too had
lifted his eyes, and forgot his broken leg as he noted each instant
of the perilous, blood curdling creep, up the glistening links of
the chain. He had even drawn himself up to Tom, and so the little
population of that speck of earth, winging its way through the
infinite void, caught there with one shuddering hope of returning to
the dear sunlight and the fair plains of the world, fixed upon Ned
their hopes and prayers, and Ned—!
Tom pulled himself together, the horrible fancy of Ned falling,
falling, falling, through that hideous depth, and plunging a
dashed mass of bones on the hard earth, had almost turned him into
a faint—slowly he too raised his eyes again upward, to where a
second—it seemed to him an age—before, he had caught the scared stare
of dear Ned. He looked and there—was Ned scrambling on the pilot;
without a word Tom hauled in the hanging chain, and when its end
appeared, he saw a BROKEN LINK. Ned had seen it too—seen it before
its treacherous sundering had come, and it was in that awful glance
that Tom caught his stare, and the sudden stoppage of his ascent.
But quicker than Tom could watch, quicker than the fickle iron could
part, Ned had snatched with one hand a stanchion on the pilot and, as
the chain left him, twitching and rustling against his body, he hung
to the support, and for one minute swayed in the vast gulf, unable to
rise.
The next, with all the terrified impulse of his good strength, he
hauled himself up, and with the disengaged hand seized another rod
on the pilot and thus anchored, managed to pull his body up on the
floor. He was pretty well done up. The strain had been awful. He
felt the cold too, though the exertion had done something to rouse
the currents of his blood and, luckily enough, the party had been
well provided with food. Once on the pilot Ned felt the danger of
succumbing to the reaction. His senses were dizzy, and it was hard
for him to think. A mental effort as powerful in its way as the
muscular one which had brought him there was necessary, and Ned made
it. And then things came easier. He knew the work, and seized the
levers.
But where were they? Was New York to the north, south, east or west.
In their wild ascent from the storm clouds and the drifting of the
ship, direction had been lost, and at the height it was impossible
to make out the configuration of the surfaces beneath them. Here was
a new perplexity. The propellers kept up their interminable beating,
and the aerial boat still fanned its way amid the stars. Ned stopped
the machinery, and made some preparations for his own comfort. His
friends who had glued their ravished eyes upon him were hailing him
faintly, and he could hear Tom’s voice above them;
“Ned throw us a line, and we’ll pack a few things together and your
coat, and—Simpson says, turn the ship around—and beat north.”
Ned had already consulted the Barometer and found out their
elevation—2500 feet. They must drop. He looked around him in the
pilot and found an assortment of lines, tools, and fortunately the
compass stand, which had been knocked down, with its dial unbroken.
The telephone connexion with the car had been ruptured by the fall of
the carrying chain, and Ned wondered if he could get a line to the
car. It was less easy to call to his companions than it was for them
to speak to him. He concluded to spare his breath. Rummaging about
he found an air-line-thrower, a small affair modeled after the life
saving machines. It did not take long for him to rig this in position
and fire a line over the car; Tom caught it, tied it fast, and he and
the girls set about making up a parcel of comforting things, among
which wine and whisky were not forgotten. It was soon got ready, and
waving to Ned—the parties on either side of the air gulf could see
each other by reason of the electric lamps—the burden of delights
was launched into the space, and Ned pulled it in. Ned got his coat,
and after a replenishment that gave him strength and courage, again
turned to the serious matter of getting back to New York.
The balloon had fallen some thousand feet, but beneath them nothing
but darkness reigned, even the glasses showed nothing, and Ned peered
through them a long time. It was warmer and altogether the marooned
party felt greatly encouraged. Tom turned his attention to Simpson
again, and succeeded in making the poor fellow more comfortable
while he got from him his idea as to where they might then be, and
how he came to fall out of the pilot. Simpson said that when the
squall struck them, he had been blinded by the lightning, and in the
flight up through the fitful howling tempest, he had been seized
with a chill; after that he knew nothing, till he found himself
stunned on the floor of the car; as to where they were he was certain
that the balloon had been sheered to sea, and that every minute was
taking them over the ocean and away from the city. Ned had turned
the vehicle, and was running slowly, watching intently, for the
manifestations of life below them, the compass pointed north, and in
that direction they were now sailing.
“Oh, I see lights way down;” it was the soft voice of Jessie, and the
eyes of her companions followed hers, and there indeed a long string
of pin point lights emerged in the night, and they grew stronger,
larger, steadier. It was one of the enormous steamers that brought
Europe to New York in three days. Ned had already detected the
leviathan, and he found out the balloon was sinking. Was it falling
in the track of the steamer? Was it falling on it? A second later and
the hoarse whistle of the huge barge below them sounded excitedly,
then they all could hear voices, orders, cries, a confused tumult
of sound, while the hoarse whistle swelled into a fierce revolting
protest; its harsh, straining, shivering huskiness seemed to hit the
very side of their car, and then more voices rose, volleys of calls;
the voyagers could hear the sough of the engines, they caught the
smells of smoke and habitation, and then the whole colossus sprang
into sight, a wavy broken terrace and pyramid of lights.
It was evident that the apparition of the descending aeronauts had
started all the activities of the great steamer, while it also became
clear that the cabins and berths were being emptied, and that the
rumor of the falling balloon had penetrated throughout the vessel,
for the storm of exclamations and outcries, not free from shouts
of alarm, showed that the floating population below them was all
aroused. Then through the commotion and buzz came the heavy calls of
the megaphone;
“Hold hard there. Keep on the centre. Fall abaft the stacks. Mind
all,” and then succeeded a sound of terrific scrambling, then crash
upon crash as the great mass of the balloon bodily drifted and fell
on the deck of the steamer. The occupants of the disabled “Chariot
of Flight” had not been without danger. As the balloon came down to
the deck of the steamer, which had ceased its motion, the car struck
the upper works of the vessel first, and, with a slow settling
oscillation, rubbed along the decks and finally hung fast. Before
this Tom had extricated his charges easily, leaping out of the car
first himself, and helping them. Then he succeeded in dragging
Simpson over the edge, and with help from the crowding crew of the
steamer got him away. Ned had soon jumped to the deck, and none too
soon, as the overhanging bulk then descended, thudding the deck,
splintering rods, pins, rails, seats, nettings, and cracking with a
few subsiding thumps the deck itself. When Ned saw the inevitable
collision he had opened the valves, and thus hastened the descent.
It also robbed the balloon of all possibility of motion, and so,
at last, the long cylinder lay on the upper decks of the steamer,
its axis parallel with that of the big liner. Taken altogether the
outcome of the affair was a matter of congratulation.
The captain took Ned and Tom to his cabin, and heard their story. He
was very grave at first, and muttered some remarks about “a piece
of damned hoodlumism,” but he softened at length, after learning no
extensive damage had been done, and seeing the forlorn state of mind
of the poor fellows, who now looked forward to some rasping rebukes,
and no little loss of prestige. Tom was a little moody over it, but
Ned more philosophically resigned himself, and began calculating the
damages. They turned out to be considerable, and this was depressing,
and then to Tom the outcome was in a measure disgraceful, and the
whole aspect of the diversion might seem reprehensible. They should
have returned after the fireworks, and not attempted the long
unnecessary trip. It was altogether disagreeable and discomforting.
Jessie and Delia felt shamefaced about it, and their position on the
steamer was unpleasant. It turned out that the balloonists had gotten
far out to seaward, in the line of the incoming steamers, and that
they were, when the balloon gave out, heading for Sandy Hook. That
morning the steamer entered the harbor, and the strange outlines of
the recumbent balloon on its decks was hailed with wonder by the
ships, tugs and ferry boats of the bay.
But the early morning breakfasters in the restaurants, and later the
sober faced citizens, at their morning meal, found the entertaining
tale in the papers, all served up hot and racy, sent before the
strangely loaded steamer, by “_wireless_” to the eager journals. None
perused the strange story more wonderingly than the Mayor and Mr.
Briggs, and none with the rage and threatening menaces of Poniatowsky
and Longtinsky. Some settlements and readjustments were inevitable.
“Damnation! I knew it,” howled Poniatowsky into the dismayed face of
Longtinsky, “that poodled-faced Ratler has been playing his tricks
here. That’s plain. And you’ve been fooled, led by the ear like a
stuck pig. Damn it, I’ll kill both of them. Why—”
“Pony you’re crazy. I tell you that the girl has been led into this
naturally enough. They went up on the Fourth to see the show, and
then they went off for a lark. Not her fault, I know Jessie has been
overpersuaded. Don’t lose your wits. Kill Tom Ratler;—yes to—with
him—kill the Mayor, kill Helen Lorimer,” and the disfigured face
darkened with hate, “they’re all your enemies—mine too—but Jessie
is yours, all yours then. Can’t you put two and two together. We’re
in this for keeps. The trial comes off in a little more than three
months. Don’t spill the mill now. Things are working our way. The
Beehive is at work. If we can make our strike before Helen Lorimer
gets the turn on us, and stands for more to our people than we do—all
a damned bluff, a game of hoodwink—why then—then—we’ll get out of
this.”
“Mean it?” and the furious deceived lover seized Longtinsky at his
burly neck and gave that discomforted gentleman another sharp fright,
after his frequent fashion.
“Mean it; of course I do. You know that. We’re swimming together,
Pony, for the same shore, we neither of us can go on alone”—and yet
while he said it, the soothing speaker felt that the time must
soon come when he could disentangle himself from this tiresome and
dangerous alliance; an alliance good enough for his purposes now, but
later, FORCIBLY to be dissolved.
Longtinsky persuaded—with difficulty—Pony to let him talk alone with
Jessie, promising to put a better guard on her goings and comings
and this time he was hard and bitter with his daughter. Jessie
was genuinely contrite, and her marketings on the west side were
summarily stopped, but the love she felt for Tom was as bright as
ever, as strong, as sure, and so, with Juliet’s, “as boundless as the
sea.”
Tom was himself in some dispraise, and worried with misgivings. Of
course there were explanations, and they were accepted, though Tom
felt himself resting in a shadow, and it tormented him. He looked
eagerly for the time to come when he might redeem himself.
Ned’s employers found a most unexpected source of profit in the
misadventure, more than enough to compensate for the damages
incurred. This came about through the merited publicity given to
Ned’s heroism. The exploit was well told in a dozen different ways,
and it so enhanced Ned’s reputation that he became a lion, and
the crowds that now resorted to the Zeppelin, whence the unhappy
experience began, were almost emulous to take the excursions with
so famous and brave an aeronaut. The receipts climbed up, and the
happy owners of the balloon and of Ned, forgave him all, made him a
feature, and pocketed their swelling revenues, without disparagement,
even with many secret self felicitations that it happened as it did.
Delia’s admiration for her beau—the comely Ned—became almost
delirious, and as she basked in his reflected glory, she assumed new
airs, and, as they too became her, Ned was himself more inextricably
entangled in his love, his reputation, and the assured bliss of a
hastened marriage.
From it all Tom and Jessie had the most to regret. Jessie’s
reprimands had been harsh, and she was now effectively guarded, for
the infuriated Poniatowsky took upon himself a careful watch, his
moody and sullen spirit hovering with a murderous menace over the
least effort of Jessie’s to see her lover. Not indeed that they did
not hear from each other, nor that they did not see each other. Their
loves became more indomitable and absorbing, it became that “madness
most discreet,” which found ways and means that even a Poniatowsky
and a Longtinsky could not circumvent or challenge. And as for the
man who suffered the only physical injury, poor Simpson mended and
got well.
CHAPTER IX
THE CARDINAL
It was a delightful room. One of those happy and artificial
conjunctions of architecture and decoration sufficiently chaste
to invite repose, sufficiently curious to awaken inquiry, which a
scholar enjoys, and a man of taste envies. It was an elliptical
apartment, illuminated from a shaded skylight, with low book-cases
on two curving sides, their tops or mantels holding marble busts,
and above them on the walls, faintly creamed with rose, oddly framed
wood engravings of Albert Durer’s. At one extremity of the room an
imposing full length portrait of Pope Sextus X, then reigning, with
a _priedieu_ before it, and an enormous candlestick holding a giant
taper of red wax; at the other end a remarkable gothic tapestry of
the 15th century, enclosed in a gothic frame. It represented “The
Visit of the Magi,” its background was a deep peacock blue, sown
with tiny crescents. The offering to the Holy Child was made by
a venerable man with a long beard, wearing a sleeveless tunic of
magnificent old-rose velvet, finished at the arms, neck, and around
the edge with pearls and garnets, on white silk. The other attires in
the woven picture were rich and the Virgin’s Mother’s of wonderful
beauty.
There were six chairs in the room, all different in design, archaic
and ponderous, cushioned with embossed leather and bearing the
singular decoration of a spread eagle.
A square heavily carved center table, on four stout mahogany legs
formed of clambering boys on slips of trees whose branches supported
the table top, and ended in twigs and leaves, which ran profusely
around the sides of the table in a kind of frieze below its scarcely
jutting edges, filled the centre of the room. It was in scrupulous
order—the files of books upon it being carefully arranged in book
racks, and so placed with reference to a leathern framed blotter, at
one side of the table, as to suggest their convenient use by any one
sitting there.
This place was indeed occupied by Cardinal Fenton—whom we have seen
before—and, in his red cassock, with a pectoral cross, a beretta
margining his black hair and that observant gaze, leaning back in
a chair that surrounded him with griffins and perching imps, and
with the brass emblem over him, half suggesting a bird’s flapping
consternation, he gave to the room the desirable finish of personal
dignity. And before him at the opposite side of the table stood a
young man of remarkable beauty.
He was indeed rather beautiful than handsome. His oval face, not too
weakly drawn, was crowned with curling jetty hair, his lips closed
in a perfect bow, his eyes liquidly glowing, indicated tenderness,
and the straight Grecian nose, with the white temples, the delicate
modelling of the ears, and the suavity of posture in the lithe, and,
a little undersized, figure imparted a half boyish, half feminine
impression. Still there were reasons for thinking he was not under
puberty and not possessed of power. A moustache covered his upper
lip, and as the Cardinal spoke, or when he himself spoke, at moments,
the color rose steadily in his cheeks, and his eyes flashed—and
then the voice itself was also fully conditioned in age; it was a
barytone, eloquent and sustained, with a tendency to deeper notes,
not often used but obviously there, if a stronger emphasis was needed.
His scrupulous dress was excellent in its perfect fit, and it
was noticeably quiet in color. Indeed in color there was in this
interesting figure just one note, a scarf of red silk and a garnet
pin.
“Yes,” it was the Cardinal’s voice, “we have reached a period
of forcible religious contraction. The Church seems strong, is
strong, but only because she is the surviving refuge. The world has
decorously repudiated faith.”
“Decorously?” interrogated his listener.
“Yes, I think that suits,” answered the Cardinal gravely, “There
is not hatred, though that exists; there is an amused toleration,
more pernicious in its effects, more detestable, but absolutely
indifferent. De Maistre, who believed in an _auto-da-fe_ and defended
the Inquisition, would be curiously confounded to-day. Rather than
be burned at the stake, the present up-to-date philosopher would
assent, and, under compulsion do all the things the Church asked him
to do, and—without a semblance of immodesty—continue to do so with
gayety in his heart and a lie on his lips. Not, believe me—” this in
remonstrance to an attempted interruption—“that the same philosopher
would feel as comfortable doing it as not doing it—not that he
would not anathematize the authority, that commanded it—but, doing
it to save his skin, feel it was about as important as wiping his
feet or lifting his hat, equally a deference to custom. The modern
philosopher is pusillanimous under durance; he has not the iron
courage of the heretic of six centuries ago.”
“But why bring the Pope to the United States, Father?”
“Why? Look about you. These are the latter days of scripture. I
believe the chosen number approaches completion, and religion will
soon become abridged to a vanishing quantity and—left with its
Science, its Philosophy, and with its Ribaldries of Sense—this old
world will be let to go on its way, whither it will, unchecked and
uncared for. Religion—I mean the Church—to-day has disappeared in
Europe—let it entrench itself, for the short time remaining to it, in
this virile country, yet responsive to the ordinances and formulas.
Let the Head of the Church be with his church, and not continue
the idle function of repeating a stale falsehood in a traditional
position, no longer honored, but openly scorned. Reclamation is
impossible—The Church can see but one finality, its own speedy
departure, lifted up, as it were, as its Sacrament is daily
lifted up, into the clouds, into the invisible realm of ideality,
to be suddenly returned again with a tyrannous power—with burning
fulminations—with sectionizing and filtering tests—with its Christ,
to judge and to ordain.”
The Cardinal sat erect, and the pale face flushed and the rebuking
eyes—those singular and noticeably inquisitive features in the
countenances of confessors—flamed, as if with inspiration. His
auditor was not however averse to argument, and after a short silence
which seemed a respectful acknowledgment of admiration—he spoke in an
accent which showed his Italian extraction, but it was pleasing to
hear, and detracted in no wise from his polished poise of language
and utterance.
“The world is not yet burnt out. Neither as a physical fact nor as
a spiritual being. It remains both ways. Is it not a better place
to live in? Do we not live better each year? If wickedness thrives
so does goodness thrive. I am a Catholic churchman. Yes. But I have
common sense, appreciation, sympathy. Because men are not catholic
churchmen—let us admit, because they are less and less catholic
churchmen, must the world be considered a futility, must it end? If
the Church is catholic indeed, I think, it must provide ways and
means for those who are not catholic. Will you, Father and Prince of
the Church, annihilate the blameless because they do not believe?”
The Cardinal leaned forward with both hands clenched on the blotter
in front of him; he seemed to stretch out his neck and the words
came, as if deliberately weighed, before they were allowed to pass
his lips, they came so slowly.
“Yes; that is the condition; it is hard—but not merciless.
Annihilation cannot be regretted, it might be feared. But this
civilization does not fear it, therefore to it, annihilation is no
penalty. Perhaps catholic theology has passed the point where every
human soul must be accounted for. The Church is larval in this
world, imaginal elsewhere—and as it grows together the constituents
of another transfigured existence in the hurly-burly of a world
disowning it, catching, as it can, the materials for its ultimate
perfectibility, it must obey at all times its LAW of FORM, the index
of its crystallographic symmetry. It knows no compromise, it does not
even know what compromise means. IT REMAINS ITSELF.
“Let the world be wise; let Science and Philosophy keep their
votaries busy, let it grow more comfortable and more self indulgent,
let it banish pain and prolong life—what of it? It means nothing; for
such progress is a superficial gloss, the impermanent fashioning of
perishable things. Utility is one thing; Immortality is another. The
world improves one, the Church absolutely safeguards the other.
“The Church has no quarrel with human improvement, ease of living,
bettered political conditions. It knows to-day it has itself
been stultified by its own human ignorance—but its fraility, or
its meanness, or its cruelty, inhered in its human elements. Its
stains cannot obscure its prerogative. Let these ameliorations
grow, multiply, and glory and gratitude be to those who bring them,
but after all, are they more than the shuffling materialities of
the crust? The Church moulds into immaterial permanence the human
essence. It has its PROCESS. If the great workman Feil intended to
make a lens so gigantic that its light gathering power would bring
the Planet Mars to our feet, that lens could be made in but one way.
The patented right to make an everlasting soul is the Church’s—let
that be the challenge.”
There was again a pause—the young man sank into a chair, his eyes
half strangely—almost with astonishment—perusing the Cardinal, who
had lost the tense attitude, and looked sorrowfully, and yet smiled
at him.
“Father I am not enforced to subscribe to all this—or am I? I cannot.
It would be treason to reason to put into nothingness the greatness,
sweetness, patience, virtue, that has died outside of the Church
doors. That is the madness of conceit. This doctrine Sir,
“_Conjures the wandering stars and makes them stand
Like wonder-wounded hearers._”
Cardinal Fenton stood and his voice losing its defiance became sweet,
and sad. He stood—looking at the pectoral cross which he had raised
above him; it might almost have seemed that he spoke to himself, and
IT, and, as the listener himself arose, he leaned over the table
between them as if catching a whispered confidence.
“The hardship of thy service is in being misunderstood! To proclaim
salvation and charity, but to proclaim them under limitations, that
is the test of conviction, and it is often bitter toil—yet, _in
hoc signo_—” he kissed the symbol, and sat down. He turned to the
youth again, and his voice resumed its former authority but more
quietly “I too have wrestled with this myself, but the stoic stage
approaches when I feel no more compunction; indeed I now stamp
assertion with the harshest lineaments of what appears to be an
illiberal exclusiveness. Why not! This emblem appertains to a body
of irreversible dogma. Why adulterate or dilute their meaning by
subterfuge or concession? And what if there has been goodness, and
patience, and virtue, and devotion, outside of the Church?—they
have been useful, they have made dark places bright and illuminated
misery, but they are _corpora divagua et principia ambigua et
speciosa_, because unattached to a primordial propaganda.
“Protestantism is a correction. It protects the Church from the
_poison_ of Success, and the abuse of power—and because these United
States have practically been a protestant country, here the Church
has borne a regal front, has watched and worked; yes, has most nearly
touched her best ideals.
“But, my son pardon me—I mean now to engage in no futile arguments
with you. You are at liberty, within the purview of the Church’s
correction to see these things differently. Let me return to our
beginning—the translation of the Papal See, to New York—”
“Yes, yes,” was the ardent answer, “that is what I visited you at your
own invitation to hear about. But—”
He was interrupted, a servant entered, bearing on a silver
card-receiver the card of a visitor. The Cardinal looked up with
pleasure; “How opportune. It is Miss Lorimer. She is an accomplice
with me in bringing this project to pass, if indeed it is ever
realized. She is beautiful and good, a wonderful woman, as effective
in doing as in thinking. Her resolves have a masculine energy, and
she strains to her ends with an opulent hand.”
At that instant Miss Lorimer entered the room. She was indeed
radiantly beautiful. Her grace, the dignity that she easily gave her
bearing, was not more marked than the heartiness of address, and the
cordiality which it accompanied;
“Ah Father, I surprise you perhaps. Is this an intrusion?”
“A most fortunate encounter. This,” turning to the young man, “is
a kinsman of mine, a true son of the Church—Daughter, and, though
born here in our own country, having a lineage like your own that
spreads its many branches in the tree of an intricate Italian
genealogy—Rudolph Amato, Miss Lorimer.”
The young man had been busy with his eyes. How could he help
it—anything so gloriously vivid and capturing he thought he had
never seen; her voice, her eyes, the witchery of her manner, and
the easily detected ardor of her heart, seized him as with the
force of a physical impact. His own tell-tale eyes betrayed this
sudden impression, and Helen Lorimer, in whose heart Love had taken
up its home—at whose feet too so many eloquent offers had been
supplicatingly placed—was able to read those same tell-tale eyes.
Perhaps she could not altogether restrain the happy feeling of power
they revealed to herself—a power every beautiful woman cherishes for
its own sake.
Nor was the handsome masculine creature before her unnoticed in this
light challenge of observation—an American in whose veins, as in her
own, coursed the liquid fires of Italy—and a Catholic; his admiration
gave his own beauty a heightened color, and by the instinctive
training of nature, whose art, in her best made creature, rests in
an equalization of parts, his voice, his manner, his words met the
requirements of her attention. She felt instantly friendly to him.
Helen Lorimer placed herself opposite to the Cardinal, with the young
Amato—indeed their chairs almost touched. It seemed so familiar and
pleasant to the Cardinal, that he framed them together in his speech,
“My children, I have made you my confidants in this singular design
because, from you at least, Miss Lorimer, the idea itself first came.
Since you spoke of it I have been most earnestly canvassing its
possibilities, and yesterday received from Rome a batch of letters,
which will certainly interest you, though but a few can now be
alluded to. Amato has just returned from Rome and Europe, and all he
tells me shows that our plan coincides well with conditions that have
grown insupportable. The Church like some sea bathed island is now
inundated with the rising tides of infidelity, and the swift changes
of thought threaten to exterminate her shrinking borders. What can
be done?—Well, in answer to my carefully guarded question as to the
concentration of the Church forces here in America, raising here
some stronger bulwark against the seditions of the age—which I did
not conceal flourished everywhere among us—this is the reply of the
Archbishop of Ferrate;
Dearly Beloved Brother,
Your inquiry came not amiss. We are to-day like the prisoners of
Ice in Dante’s canto. We are encased in repudiation and enmity,
and cannot move. On all sides the pressing repression seals and
disables us. It is beating the air to preach or exort or prophesy.
I look over a deserted realm, and as it were see the meadows and
gardens of religion empty, perhaps a solitary man, or some ancient
lady, here and there still plucking their flowers, resting in their
leafy refuges, or walking by their affluent streams, and beyond
these delicious walls of safety I see too the vast populations of
the nations, tumultuous, unrestrained, forgetful, chasing whims and
fantoms, gaudy butterflies of ornament, the delusions of sense, the
pragmatisms of science, lulled to sleep by the worn out iterations
of philosophy, or simply stretched over the sun-baked flats of
Common Sense, without motion, helpless, destitute, naked, forlorn,
hopeless.
Perhaps there is a tide in our affairs which leads on to fortune,
and it is this call of yours to come to America, to lift there
again the Holy State. I know not; who can? I have importuned
several, and they all think seriously of it. But it is a great
matter. The Consistory will discuss it and it will be laid before
the Holy Father. But will it be better in your new world? Let us
not uproot an ancient heritage only to plant upon some shifting
sands:
_Nil agit exemplum litem quod lite resolvit._
Write your explicit purpose, and all things will be
considered.
Your Brother and servant in Christ,
Alonzo of Ferrate.
“My purpose Children would be this; you Amato return to Italy and
explain the essential unity and solidity of the Church in these
United States, its wealth, the formal splendor of its possessions,
and ceremonies, its liberal spirit, yet conserving too the faith once
delivered to the Saints, its honored estate in the eyes of men, its
numerical majority. Accentuate the sharp contrast with Europe. Let
the Church publish its repudiation of Europe, and with august dignity
leave it, surrendering it to the perversions of its own reason, while
its trailing banners cross the ocean, and in the New World its
recreated cradle be found, amid a vast service of song and prayer,
and, thus fixed again upon the earth, in this wondrous nation lift
its standards under fairer skies, waiting for its redemption from the
bondage of a longer stay upon the earth.
“And you dear Daughter, I hoped to join with me in preparing for
this sublime event; in making ready in this very city the future
seat of the Vicar of Christ. Your own council in this has been my
guide and hope. No one can whisper against me that I have used a
prelatical influence with you,—the common housewife’s abuse of
priestly craft——No! this was your own thought. Hardly the dream of
it had entered my mind, when you spoke to me of this strange and
glorious——for such I now regard it——project. It will crown our days.
It will be the signet of a new era; like some titanic convulsion
_When all the sway of earth
Shakes like a thing unfirm_,
but it may also be the harbinger of fairer skies.”
Helen Lorimer looked a moment at Amato, who remained silent, and a
blush rose to her cheeks, as she found his eyes fixed on her. It
almost seemed to her that perhaps he had not heard the words of the
Cardinal. The embarrassment was unnoticed, and Miss Lorimer spoke.
It was then curious to observe how the young man listened, and had
the Cardinal watched him he might have been impelled to rebuke his
too evident pleasure. He even turned his chair slightly that he
might more easily see the speaker and, or was it especially for the
pleasure of hearing her? Doubtless he heard, but no one would have
guessed he cared much for the things she said; any one might have
told he was falling in love with the speaker.
“Father” said Miss Lorimer “it has been _my_ thought and I am proud
of it. There is a spot that can be made into a beautiful home for
the Pope. It is the summit of Staten Island. Here is a glorious
outspread view of the ocean, and of the city. The place has a scenic
perfection, and it would also seem to have a kind of symbolic beauty
in it too. The incoming ships and steamers are seen from the high
top; yet
_The murmuring surge
That on the unnumbered idle pebbles chafes,
Cannot be heard so high_—
“Yes it can be made supremely fit. The world’s clamor cannot come
there and yet the world’s voice can come. It can all be secured,
for there are few houses on it as yet, it being an old estate or
reservation. It has been called _Todt_ Hill meaning the Dead Hill,
from some far off legend of their having been a massacre there of the
early Dutch, by the first Indians. We shall make it the Hill of Life.
And my idea would be to keep it very simple and unostentatious, full
of trees with the wide glimpses below, and a simple serviceable home,
some jewel of a church on the highest point, and the home of the
Pope, also very simple. I would drop all the abundant pomp of Rome.
That would be pernicious here. The utmost severity of living, a kind
of homely husbandry. Nothing to tempt the criticism of our democracy.
Just the furnishment of the Pope’s court and that bare as it can be
made. What else is necessary? Nothing I think. Let the sublimity
be moral rather than physical; a few well selected treasures, the
impress of culture but all the larger corporeal grandeur cut off.”
The Cardinal smiled approvingly, and then Amato spoke. “Why Father
should you not go. I would be a poor embassador to Europe. I have no
authority. It is true I brought these letters, and I have seen the
fathers of the Church, and Father, perhaps, in that greater matter
that concerned me—well—I think that I must pause a while.”
The Cardinal started, and a shadow of wonder passed over his face,
the young man reddened to his fine white temples, and Helen Lorimer
felt the slight shock of some misunderstanding between the two men;
somehow she felt that she was its cause.
“I am sorry my son,” said the Cardinal, “we can talk of that another
time. I do not think that I could do as well as you in showing just
what is expected here, and what are the chances here, and for my own
part—well—there are several reasons that would make the mission, in
my hands, impertinent.” He looked earnestly at Amato, and his serious
countenance took on the expression of pained abstraction, almost as
if he had forgotten his visitors and his own intentions, while he
rested those scrutinizing eyes of his upon the young man with an
increasing severity.
Miss Lorimer felt the unseen obstruction, and rose.
“One moment,” began the Cardinal who also stood up, “one moment Miss
Lorimer. Just a few words will show you how far we have got along in
this difficult scheme. Nothing very definite has as yet been effected
abroad, but I am sending out communications to all the bishops,
over the names of a council of American bishops who you know have
discussed this subject. This council has told you of its gratitude
for your proffered help. It has been fairly unanimous in considering
the many aspects of the plan—and I had hoped that Amato would assist
us in reaching, in a personal way, certain influential members of the
papal household, before we came more out in the open——as it were—in
placing the whole subject upon a public basis of discussion. But—”
here a glance of mute reproach at the beautiful youth, who with
crimsoned cheeks, and an evidently rising temper, stood near Miss
Lorimer, “perhaps something more will develop shortly, and it will
be my pleasure to let you know everything. I agree with your views
exactly as to the delicacy of the innovation. Nothing must jar or
irritate the spirit of our countrymen. It involves for the Church
a new procedure, a new vista, a new apprehension of its tasks. It
is pregnant with the strangest possibilities of good. It is likely
to land us too in new vicissitudes. It is a challenge to the age
in one sense, and again IT IS RETREAT. Perhaps a clerical habit of
thought makes me dull, but I foresee a new warfare, and the Church
Militant deserving its name in a fiercer struggle. For the Pope to
leave Rome and confound the traditions of over two thousand years, to
reestablish his theological supremacy in this newer world, means a
violation of prestige whose consequences we can scarcely measure.”
Miss Lorimer turned to the young and yet silent man at her side, and
invited him to visit her, and handed him her card, and then to the
Cardinal, yet watching with an alert suspicion, she gave her hand,
bade him farewell, and protesting that they had not seen him lately
left the room, and, escorted by an attendant, the residence.
The two men were facing each other in the room that, to the younger,
had suddenly grown distasteful, after the glorious woman that had
been near him there, had left it.
“Rudolph,” it was the Cardinal speaking, “you have been entranced,
perverted by beauty. You renounce a mission you were anxious to
undertake. But more grievously you will deny the Church your
consecrated service. Is it so?”
“Father” answered the Amato, but without a tremor of hesitation, “I
do. I never will be a priest. You say I am perverted by beauty. It
is no perversion. I love that woman who left us. I care nothing for
promise, advowson, nor expectation. I have not been sure that I was
right to engage myself so closely in your plans. _I do love life._ My
visit in Europe stirred the fires of my emotion. It suddenly painted
the skies and put flowers on the earth. The hidden, separated,
cloistered, existence grew hideous to my eyes—impossible. I am not
traitorous to my ideals, to my service to the Church. No, no, they
remain, but all the beckoning truthful loveliness of life overwhelms
me now. It seems embodied in that superb woman, who has just left us.
Call it what you will, revile me, despise me, but I break with the
past. It has now no meaning; it was a mistake, a mad design made
thoughtlessly, in obedience to one strong feeling, which now turns to
weakness before a stronger—Oh—an irresistible compelling impulse.”
There was good reason for the Cardinal to trust his ears, though
he was angry enough to be compelled to; to his eyes the Passion in
Rudolph Amato’s face was palpable enough. The Mayor would have felt
some distrust of his fancied security in Helen Lorimer’s opening
affections—and perhaps Helen Lorimer herself—susceptible to beauty,
carrying in her breast the yet but half awakened power of love,
would have bowed before a storm that came so suddenly, a storm like
some onrushing freshet of the spring, bearing all before it in its
tumultuous rending strength.
The Cardinal gazed at the young man with interest. He was breathing
heavily, his arched lips parted, his eyes became intensely dark and
brilliant, and, through some impatient movement of his head, his
raven black hair, hanging almost artfully, shading the pale brow and
brushing the burning cheeks; and the Cardinal’s interest turned to
admiration.
Cardinal Fenton was a connoisseur, and he responded intuitively to
every glimpse and form of beauty; he was indeed a _bon vivant_, and
a man of subtlety, faculties conjoined in him with intellectualism,
administrative resources, and an almost inerrant judgment, within
which too ran the current of an optimistic policy. But he knew
Cleopatra’s maxim, “wishers were ever fools,” and, one expedient
dashed, it was not lamented, but itself trodden upon by a quick
successor.
He understood Rudolph Amato, and he knew that instant that he was
lost as a priest to the Holy Roman Catholic Church, but his flashing
instinct told him he was yet useful, a tool rejected in one service
can be brought to an infinite test of usefulness in another.
And so this bundle of unfixed desires must not be too loosely
pardoned, too carelessly freed from his own sense of obligation. He
stood yet in the place of service, of friendship, of fealty—much
value remained. The quickly coining Cardinal knew that, and just now
when his own ambition—for Cardinal Fenton was ambitious—had launched
a tremendous undertaking, an instrument so skillful—he knew Amato’s
talent—must be kept husbanded, not rejected, because wandering from
its first design.
The Cardinal kept his appreciation of Amato’s beauty to himself, and
when he answered, “wait,” he motioned the young man to his seat,
sat down himself, rang a bell, and told the servant, who attended,
to bring them wine and cordials and cigars—the latter for Amato—the
Cardinal never smoked, and, though he relished the qualities of
good wines, he was abstemious: he yielded to a perverse appetite
for cordials. When these were brought, and the two had regained a
composure mutually lost for an instant, the Cardinal without at once
raising his eyes from the liqueur glass before him—a delicate affair
of cut glass and gold—spoke;
“Rudolph Amato you must remember some things. Your dying Mother
entrusted you to me when her husband deserted her—and, when your
Father was brought home dead, killed in some brawl in Constantinople,
I secured for you his wealth, guarded it, increased it. You must
realize that your education—certainly better than is usually allotted
to young plutocrats—since you were protected, by me against the
indulgences your fortune made possible—was under my charge;” there
was a motion of expostulation from Rudolph—“Yes; I remember too some
things—I recall them with sorrow now. I did indeed hope you would
enter holy orders; I recognized your poetic power of language, your
unadulterated idealistic fancies, your spiritual grace; I knew the
needs of the Church; I hoped—alas; how vainly—that you would become
a priest, and I was not placing too great a sanction in my faith in
your powers and virtue to promise these eyes the pleasure of seeing
you exalted to the bishopric, and hearing your voice raised in aid,
in the desperate approaching crises of the Church. Nothing else I
can recall, ever disappointed these expectations until this moment.
You were obedient, grateful, indefatigable and devout, apparently
contented with this prescription, even accepting it with enthusiasm.
Are you quite sure you do not owe me a greater effort at self-control
than you have shown; is it fair to me; is it fair to the Church?”
Again there was a short silence. Amato—so quickly swayed by any
sympathetic appeal—had walked around the table and was kneeling
before the Cardinal; his upturned face told his contrition—if it
were contrition—or at the worst his honest regret for the Cardinal’s
disappointment; but it told nothing of a changed mind. The Cardinal
placed his hand on the handsome youth—he really loved him as a
son—and the severity melted from his face, though he yet withheld
his pardoning smile, reserving a little the new purposes he intended
Amato to undertake.
Amato regained his feet apparently satisfied with the relenting
gesture of the Cardinal. He spoke less impetuously, but the Cardinal
noted—and he was a keen listener—only a deeper settled determination
to banish the past, uproot its incentives, and its aims, to—forget
it, to
_Wipe away all trivial fond records,
All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past,
That youth and observation copied there._
The Cardinal saw the logic in nature of this sudden change; a growth
leaping to the light, and brought into instant blossom by the beauty
of Helen Lorimer. At least, he should guide it in its further
advances there,—and keep it too. Here were two great talents, two
great fortunes; they should be forged into a great implement of
protection against the adversities of the Church.
“There could be no greater injustice to you Sir, nor to the Church,
if I covered myself with the confusion of a bitter renunciation,
which I rebelled against. I should have made myself into a
distracted fool, perhaps worse—a fool and an apostate;
_Velut silvis, ubi passim
Palantes error certo de tramite pellit,
Ille sinistrorsum, his dextrorusm abit; unus utrique
Error, sed variis illudit partibus_.
“What lay undiscovered has been, as with a lightning’s flash,
revealed. This moment has been providential. If, as you once taught
me, God stirs the wind, that stirs the leaf, that drops its tiny
pellet of dew upon the thirsting flower, at the foot of the tree,
that becomes the adornment of the altar whereon the Sacrament shall
lie, then I feel that I have been saved by the same interposition
from a blunder, and you from a disgrace.
“If service is wanted I am still yours to use, but a fire now bums so
brightly in my soul, that all the waters of abnegation could not put
it out.”
The Cardinal was now looking very earnestly at the speaker, who
returned his gaze unabashed, and strangely enough there dawned on
both faces a smile. On the elder man it appeared as an imperceptible
admission of defeat, on the younger as the harbinger of happiness.
Perhaps in neither case was it justified, for the issues for either
of them were yet undecided.
“Well,” said the Cardinal, “I must still remain your confessor. I
confess if I must withdraw those hopes, that you, to this day, have
consistently strengthened, the unions of your name with that of Helen
Lorimer would also give me pleasure, and—let us believe it is God’s
better way;” he paused, turned again in his hand the fragile glass,
and then continued, “Miss Lorimer is a beautiful woman indeed; she is
a remarkable one too, and much admired, and her hand has been sought
by distinguished suitors—some of them those hungry bankrupts from
Europe. I know she has been dismayed and angry with them; she is a
year or two older than you my son—but—Ah, well, she is indeed very
beautiful, and—perhaps—you may succeed—but, if you fail; how then,
how then; have you thought of that ambitious boy?”
“I shall not fail,” was the unexpected answer, an answer that made
the Cardinal turn quickly. His glance assured him that the ardent
youth felt no misgivings, and as he saw him there, knowing too the
trained and gentle power of the boy, his intensity of tastes, and
his winning spirit, raised now by this manly daring into something
knightly, the Cardinal silently accorded him his acquiescence.
A few minutes later Rudolph Amato passed down the steps of the
episcopal residence—then as now upon Madison Avenue—and walked to
Fifth Avenue, and again he went on into the famous thoroughfare,
which still resisted, above that point, the ingression of the sky
climbing stores. Had the Cardinal been able to have followed his
protégée he would have felt some astonishment, for this _ci-devant_
postulant for the priesthood, walked briskly, with no little
assertive grace of motion, to Forty-Second Street, and, stopping for
an instant to watch the boiling tumult of that Four-corners, turned
west, and a second after entered the massive entrance of the glorious
successor of the Fleischman Baths, which, expanded far beyond the
corners of Sixth Avenue, and no longer restricted to the attic of a
building, filled a magnificent structure opposite Bryant Park, itself
changed into a brilliant bed of flowering plants.
The place was famous. It was called The Agonistarch, and roofed every
sort of athletic diversion and comfort. Huge swimming tanks, mimic
race tracks, boxing tiers, gymnasia, offices of rest and relaxation,
whimsical levities, like curious tilting stairs that went up and
down jolting into dizziness their walkers, queer rippling falls of
carpet upon which the shouting players rolled and tumbled, whirling
tables that shot the tranced occupants off into surrounding piles of
cushions, pulsating rugs that threw their human loads up into the
air, and strange downy sheaves that passed a man over and under,
twisting him into a curling line, health lifts, and precipices of
painted wood, from which the players jumped into a sea of satiny
leaves, a vast medley of conceits, where the youth of the city
resorted for repair and exercise.
It was crowned by a luxurious garden with swings and captive balloons
hedged in with coppiced fig trees, with sprinkling fountains,
perfumed winds, a theatre, big aquaria, with cages of animals,
singing birds, with mossy banks, glistening with tiny lizards, little
canals of water on which floated huge nut shells, their capsules
opening and admitting couples into the silken lined cups within them,
with clay pipes or funnels playing in great bowls of glycerized
soapsuds and blowing up iridescent bubbles, that came off in dancing
streams rising and falling and exploding, and in the midst of this
garden rose a pair of the steel antennae which emitted that wonderful
mysterious light which at night bathed the air above the city with
a wizard sheen. At night too the garden itself thrilled with a
delicately tinted illumination brought from a host of lamps.
Adjoining the Agonistarch was a hotel called the Anchorite, where
Rudolph Amato had his chambers. This hotel connected on every story
with Agonistarch, and its name was a palpable cynicism. But Amato’s
residence there need not be misconstrued. The Cardinal had brought up
his charge with the keenest sense of the enormous value of physical
perfection. It was a pet theory of the Cardinal’s, that the demand of
the flesh had two issues, one in lust, the other in exercise; that
these excluded each other. He acted on that principle with Amato, and
in him he had virtually trained a splendid athlete.
When Amato returned from his visit to Europe—sent there by the
Cardinal for the purposes hinted at in their interview—Amato had
reached his conclusion to slowly extricate himself from the implied
obligation to his spiritual guardian to enter the Church. He had
begun by assuming the control of his own fortune which, now as
he was of age, came under his own guidance, though he had allied
with himself in its direction, a business man, a lawyer of the
city, and a friend of Cardinal Fenton’s. This opening to a more
independent existence successfully accomplished, Amato began to
consider the serious problem—yet unsolved—of his life, for with
him the mere position of wealth could not abrogate the value and
meaning of occupation. His well balanced nature forbade it, and
the consciousness of availability in himself for some good ends
forbade it even more imperiously. The incidents attending these
silently working changes had kept him from the Cardinal, and that
perspicacious observer had not failed to note his absence, together
with the greater freedom of his charge in choosing his own way. It
was indeed in response to a remonstrance, that he had been at the
Cardinal’s on that day, when—as he felt—the meeting with Miss Lorimer
suddenly illumined his future with purpose and decision.
He had been attracted to the conveniences of the Anchorite from its
nearness to the excellent gymnasia of the Agonistarch and perhaps too
in an awakened desire of dalliance with the world. Its brilliancy
and the raging life around it, inwoven with the swirling activities
of commerce on all sides of it attracted him. His visit to Europe
had administered many shocks to his opening nature, and the reaction
from study and seclusion, playing in a system appropriated by its
psychology and make-up to the uses of a social life, gave him
momentarily a sense of conflict.
He knew but few persons in the city; the Cardinal had been his
confidant and friend, filling almost entirely the relations of a
father to him, and so successfully had the Cardinal kept him from
the usual intercourse of life, that the young man was practically
a stranger in the city of his birth. He had been a fairly good
student, excelling in language and in art, with no inconsiderable
power of memory, showing a predilection for history, which he most
appreciated on its poetic and artistic sides. Carefully guarded by
the Cardinal in his religious feelings his fidelity and admiration
for the Catholic Church were most sincere, and his observances of
his religious duties, onerous and constant. The plan of making
him a priest of the Church had been the Cardinal’s, with the
delighted approval of his Mother, and he had himself felt a pleasant
predisposition for this end.
And now returning to the customary anticipations of life, his youth
and nature thirsting for their satisfaction he felt a sort of mental
confusion. He had taken a rather sumptuous suite of rooms at the
Anchorite, consisting of a larger sitting room, used as a library,
and study, a smaller inner room devoted to his meals, which were
individually served to him, and a third room—his bed-room. This group
of chambers was pleasingly furnished, and, as he had chosen his
position near the top of the building, their outlook commanded the
city to the south. The comfort of it, was very real, and, bordering
as it did upon luxuriousness, Amato realized its pleasure, but
experienced a slight inner impatience and self rebuke for enjoying
them.
Of course he had been well observed by his neighbors in the
establishment, and particularly admired, in his gymnastic exercises,
for his physique and abundant skill, and his good looks. Many had
made overtures to him in a friendly way, and while Amato received
these advances with perfect courtesy, he seemed to repel familiarity,
and he offered no encouragement to that servile and indecent
_facetia_ which marred the conversations around him; he was conscious
of it and despised it. This attitude was not long in developing a
natural anger among the habituées of the place, and Amato, feeling
this, had about determined to go elsewhere, though the charm and
perfection of the material side of this popular caravansary still
held him. Among these fault-finding and petulant critics of Amato,
was a particularly large and gross fellow who took occasion again
and again to make himself obnoxious, and by a silent effrontery
caused Amato’s resentment. A mean sneer disfigured the face of his
unpleasant physiognomy when Amato appeared in the dressing rooms, or
in the baths, or in the gymnasium, and it was too evident that he
waited for some opportune moment to openly fall foul of the young
man. Amato remarked to himself, with a little trepidation, that the
man wanted to disable or injure him, and sought some occasion for a
quarrel.
It was only a day before Amato’s interview with the Cardinal that
this man’s—his name was Gynt—sullenness and envy, if it was envy,
came to a conclusion of open violence. It was customary after the
exercise in the gymnasium for the athletes and young executants to
go to the splendid bathing room, and plunge in the broad and deep
bath or pool, after enjoying perhaps a shower, in one of the many
adjoining closets. At one end of this pool, and raised somewhat above
its surface, was a jumping platform not accommodating easily more
than three, to which the men in turns ascended, leaving it as quickly
as they reached it, and so that a line of plunging figures followed
each other in an almost continuous parade into the boiling waters of
the tank.
The man Gynt was on this platform, and Amato came up behind him
for his own turn, and the big occupant of the board noticing this,
planted himself squarely on the end of the jump, and with evidently
no intention of using the board for its usual purposes, enjoyed
emitting a few stupid and vulgar railleries at his friends in the
water.
Amato waited a reasonable time, and then saw that the moment of a
collision had come. Moving up on the board he quietly asked the man
to move. The giant turned contemptuously, grinned at Amato, and with
unconcealed malice said “He guessed his young nibs could wait for his
betters,” and winking at the men in the water—, many of whom saw the
trouble brewing—, resumed his fixed and dogged attitude, with spread
legs and folded arms.
Amato then requested him to make way for himself, if he was not going
to leap, and pushed against him. In a flash, as if expecting and
coveting this very attempt to pass him, the bully seized Amato, and
before Amato could resist effectually hurled him off sideways in the
tank with an oath. Amato fell fortunately upon his head in the water,
and suffered no shock, but there was a half stilled cry of “shame,”
as he rose and swam to the egress from the water. The ruffian still
kept his place on the board, and was laughing, though not perhaps
with the best confidence, the unfairness of the trick appealing to
the settled code of honor among the men. He was looking at Amato with
a strained attention, and his eyes were joined by those of every
other man in the room, in the same scrutiny.
Amato was soon out of the water, scrambling up at one of the
stairways, and he was angry all through. His rage mounted to his
face, and he felt that this fierce rebellious temper surging now in
him formed another suddenly new break with the placid and regulated
past. He ran through the bathers around the tank, and came back to
the steps leading up to the platform, where his assailant, now less
mirthful from a sense of the general disapproval, and some sharp
reminders of the prowess of Amato, stood grimly waiting the next move
of the young man, and apparently expecting an assault, for he turned
towards the front of the stage.
The next instant Amato had passed up the steps and confronted him.
Gynt did not take advantage of his superior position to resist
Amato’s return, but remained at the end of the platform. He wore
his provoking sneer, and though evidently a little inclined to make
a joke of it, his attitude suggested his readiness for a fray. His
expectations were not to be disappointed. Amato sprang quickly in
front of him, and in a low voice said; “Mr. Gynt you’re a loafer.
Defend yourself.”
The words had scarcely passed his lips before he countered and struck
Gynt such a smart blow that the big fellow staggered and almost fell
backward into the tank. He recovered, however, and then with his
massive body plunged into the smaller but much quicker man in front
of him. The stage was too narrow for successful evolutions of the
sparring type. Amato saw this, and as Gynt rushed at him he cowered,
bent, and steadying himself with all his might and main, caught
Gynt’s body around the middle, stopping its impetus with a drive
forward. He overpowered Gynt’s motion, and the next moment with his
arms wrapped around the bulky form of the man, who had lost in part
his balance, by this sudden arrest, and was sprawling over Amato’s
back, he rose, and lifting the fighter off his feet, flung him
helplessly writhing, and dazed with astonishment, on his back into
the water.
He fell heavily and sank. The walls of the tank bristled with
crowding forms as the men watched the foaming indentation on the
surface. Gynt appeared and lamely swam to the stairway, evidently
hurt. He was breathing heavily and in pain. Then Amato did something
that, in the turn of a hand, won him the admiration of most of the
men there. He jumped from the platform swam swiftly to the point
where Gynt was being assisted, and coming behind him supported him
up. Gynt was in a faint; he had fallen in the water too violently
and suffered from an impacted side. As he came to the floor of the
room he sank into the arms of his helpers and among these was Amato.
Rudolph looked sorrowfully at the man, and then gazing around him
said; “My friends, I believe you can bear me witness that this act of
mine was not unprovoked. I am sincerely sorry that it has turned out
so badly. But would any of you have done differently? I was incensed,
and I forgot myself—but my resentment was surely not unnatural. I
had been insulted and I had never done this man any wrong. Do you
exonerate me?”
“Yes, yes, yes,” came loudly from many sides; “it was Gynt’s fault.
He was peevish and ugly. You’re all right. He isn’t hurt much. Help
him out of this, and get him some brandy,” were the various comments,
and Amato taking almost bodily the limp shape assisted the men to
carry their comrade into a dressing room, where restoratives brought
him to his senses.
He came to slowly, and when fully conscious roamed the room weariedly
with his eyes until they fell upon the watching Amato; his face
contracted and an impulsive shudder shook him. He seemed to dread
Amato, and turned his face aside. Amato leaned over him and said, “I
am very sorry. Will you give me your hand?”; but the man remained
silent, and then Amato slowly moved off and walked away.
The incident gave the habituées of the Agonistarch a very salutary
impression of Amato’s great strength, and during the rest of his stay
there, he was a momentary favorite. His exclusiveness and repression
were forgiven, and many good words came to his ears, unsolicited,
praising his magnanimity, while he learned that Gynt had already
won some enmities among the weaker men by his overbearing and
bullying style. He left the Anchorite a few days later, with a good
reputation, and a moderate popularity.
Amato was indeed now an example of a discovered temperament. Brought
up with a carefully inculcated confidence in the Church, with an
assiduously perfected environment of religious considerations, with
the cultured superintendence of affectionate and learned tutors, and
imbued himself with the dawning powers of a Rossettian taste for the
mysterious and moonish, he, at first, in his younger years put on all
the aspects of a recondite and spiritual nature. These appearances
really covered a strongly human and virile sense, in which all the
appetencies of the man had grown into rounded and perfect size. Like
a rolling away of a cloth concealing some hidden growth which at the
first touch of the generous sun spawns again into a vivid flourish of
flowers, Amato’s movement out upon the scene of the world’s powerful
appeals, its pictures, and its wreathing invitations, had torn from
his eyes the sapient tapestry of his artful schooling, and he leaped
like an actor from the dark flies of the stage into the pageant of
the play’s procession.
But he came upon that stage “with modest eyes and still conclusions,”
though his heart panted with desire. The skill of his education
kept him restrained, and the serviceable disposition bred in him,
stiffened his senses with admonitory cautions. And thus by an almost
heavenly opportunity—the form, face, and character, of Helen Lorimer
came before him. That “psychological moment,” so much maligned
and misnamed, was here a potent fact and deep reality. Limited
by training, and habit, and ingrained teaching, from catching,
as it were, the world in his arms—arms that ached to embrace and
enjoy—there walked right into the focus of his raised eyes this
beautiful and noble woman.
That explained in a sort of way his sudden passion, his convinced
determination. And here again there was a paradox. To a man, whose
intercourse with women had always been on the decorous extremes
of civility, strengthened by what had been assumed as a foregone
abnegation, Amato’s fervor and unhesitating self-confidence seemed
abnormal, if not grotesque. It was so. It arose exactly from his
inexperience. His love flamed upward like a discharging igneous
flood. It knew no barriers; it cared for none. Circumspection was
ridiculous, apprehension impossible. The wind blew, his sail was
fixed, he knew his port.
_So that when Hope’s deep source in fullest flow,
Like earthquake did uplift the stagnant ocean
Of human thoughts—his shook beneath the wide emotion_.
It would have amused the travelled courtier of the world, this
unquestioning certainty; Amato’s mind fled even beyond the hour of
possession, and he had begun to lay his plans for the mutual service
he and Helen Lorimer might render the world. He exulted in these
reveries. In them his love, his religious earnestness, his ambition,
his feeling of accountability, blended delightfully. The young man
walked in clouds, but he was not so far above the earth, the hard
ground of day life, as to neglect beginning his suit. Contiguity was
important.
He deserted the Anchorite, leaving it, yet unreconciled with his
enemy Gynt, and established himself at the southern boundary of
Carrara, in the Arrowhead Inn. To-day that half metamorphosed villa,
turned to the uses of entertainment, under old oaks, and glimpsing
the river at 168th Street, and the Lafayette Boulevard, down a
creased hillside, is a promising eerie for dreams and good dinners.
In the year 2000 it would still retain its summery charm, under
yet greater shadowing oaks, but much changed, expanded into a red
tiled mansion of three stories, with a bulging skirt of balconies at
every story, and fitted for the seclusion of all those who required
or cared for retirement, and divested of its present day publican
features.
It was a delightful nook, and Amato found it most convenient
and inviting. A pale of trees hid the crowning glory of New
York—Carrara—to the north; there was not much to wish to see in
the east, another wall of umbrage shut off the south, but westward
through artificially prepared arches of boughs, the noble river, with
its cargoes, cargasons, and excursions, fed the eyes with interest.
The night that Amato left him, the Cardinal passed into the
cathedral, for his evening devotion. The late twilight of a bright
day bathed the interior—walls, clerestory, pavements, and flaming
windows—with a vanishing light; the shadows crept upward against
the pale illumination, that shrank more and more into the higher
recesses, or spun itself in ropes of mote deluged rays from the
apertures in the roof. A few supplicants knelt here and there in the
darkened pews, the vestal light burned before the high altar, while
guttering tapers in front of the shrine of the Holy Mother, gave
forth an unsteady radiance.
The Cardinal advanced through the gates of the chancel rails, and,
prostrating himself at the very foot of the sanctuary, stayed, thus
bowed in a prayer, that was half meditation, half uttered petitions.
His heart was indeed heavy. He had regarded Amato as a spiritual
son and he had wished to embrace him as one with himself in the
transcendental service of the altar, and now—this precious offering
to God had turned away his face, regained the world, released himself
from that immaterial bondage of the spirit, which meant the eternal
liberty of Heaven, and would no longer be his companion in the
mystical company of the Priesthood.
Ah! he too—the great Cardinal—had his affections, his heart yearned
with the human implanted hunger for love, thirsting perhaps with a
grievous loneliness for that metaphysical union of soul with soul,
which, in its dim and spectral way, stands for those—involved in self
immolation to the world—for the material partnership of the earth.
The Cardinal prayed for Amato’s joy, his success, his usefulness; he
struggled with himself to give those prayers true potency, and he
fought off the complaining regrets that he really felt. He prayed for
Helen Lorimer, he prayed that this union of two whom he had watched
and guided, who represented to him a very virtual excellence, might
redound to the glory of the Church, might form a new and blessed
nucleus for the spreading of truth.
And, even as he prayed, his heart rebelled. _He knew that._ But
before he left that throne of grace, though the night was spent
in the vast effort he would subdue the warring flesh—if flesh it
was—and, devoutly, humbly, yield up his life-long hope to the
ordained purposes of his God.
The twilight faded, the poor wanderers from the street who had
entered to grasp some crumbs of comfort in the still holiness of the
place, had, one by one, wonderingly left. A desperate woman came to
the chancel rails and sobbed her heartbreak there, and she, with a
muttered ejaculation of surprise, had gone away, the sexton snuffed
out the tapers, and observing the Cardinal yet motionless on the
altar grades, had crept off in a keen bewilderment; darkness muffled
nave and apse and transept in the black gloom, save as a penumbral
light smeared the colored windows, and broke disheartenedly through
their red and purple shades; the whispering noises of a deserted
habitation were heard, and with them came anon cries, or rumblings,
or beats of trotting horses, or uncertain whizzes, impossible to
understand, and yet—the unmoved figure of the Cardinal like a blacker
clot stained the lightness of the altar steps.
But now he rises; the victory is won; he has surrendered his heart’s
fondest desire, and his soul in contentment, with submission, bows to
the new change. But were the darkness less deep, one standing near
his stumbling path out of the sanctuary, would have detected tears on
the grave face, and lines beneath the tired eyes.
Still later in the night, as when the dawn was first preparing the
eastern skies, a reeling man leaning against the wall of the Bishop’s
house stared upward and saw a light in a lower window, and he saw
into the room, and saw there too a man dressed and reading; it was
the Cardinal, and the page he so steadfastly perused held these
words; they may be found in _De Imitatione Christi_;
“My son renounce thyself and thou shalt find Me. Give up all choice,
all personal inclination, and thou shalt even be the gainer. For
greater grace shall be given thee as soon as thou resignest thyself
unalterably.
“‘O Lord how often shall I resign myself, and in what respects am I
to renounce myself?’
“Always every hour: in small things as well as greater ones. I
except nothing; but wish to find thee in every respect naked. How
otherwise will thou be able to be Mine, and I thine, unless thou
have been deprived of every personal inclination, respecting either
external things or internal feelings? The sooner thou dost accomplish
this the better it will be with thee, and the more completely and
thoroughly thou doest this, the more wilt thou please Me, and the
greater will be thy gain?”
The drunken man fearful a little of the apparelled priest, and not
unobservant of the approaching steps of a policeman, stole away
in the deserted street, where the fading light of the lamps yet
struggled with the misty lightening of the sky.
And just at that same hour, the luxurious Amato pushing his feet
out of the sheet upon the rugged floor, and seeing the same dawn
paint with its dewy rays the opposite wall, rubbing his winking eyes
straightened himself, and staring at the colored picture of a full
sailing ship upon the rolling green waves of an interminable sea,
suddenly leaped to his feet and cried;
“It was the same. Yes, the lady in the box at the Mayor’s speech in
the Carnegie Hall, was Helen Lorimer.”
CHAPTER X
THE MAYOR’S COURTSHIP
Admiration throughout the City-State had been growing over the
administration of the Mayor, its Governor, and it had not been
confined to any class. He had exhibited exacting industry, careful
judgment and unexpectedly evinced the qualities of poise and
decision, virtues which the observant Mr. Briggs had so hugely
doubted he possessed. Nor did he appear less advantageously on the
dress occasions of the city’s public ceremonies. He had made a
really remarkable public speech in which he discussed many of the
coming questions of the day and century, emphasized the absolute
supremacy of Law and Order and, by an adroit mixture of rhetoric and
facts, succeeded in holding an audience composed of every grade and
circumstance, and which departed uttering golden opinions over his
sense and his eloquence.
He had not hesitated to explain his action in allowing a reprieve
to the convicted anarchists—an action which for a time brought down
upon his head the fulminations of the better papers, and exposed him
to the scurrilous abuse of his enemies—and defended their complete
right to obtain a new trial. Without divulging the nature of the
new evidence in their behalf, he boldly declared an injustice had
been done and that, if judgment was suspended, his course would
be universally endorsed. He talked straight to the hearts of his
hearers, in this matter, and appealed to their American sense of
fairness. He had consulted Helen Lorimer about this address, and
almost with rapture he had inserted in it many of her suggestions,
jealously preserving their exact language.
Her cheeks flushed as she recognized her own words, and she
perceptibly leaned forward a little to catch the well adjusted
sentences, joining with proud elation in the tribute of applause as
he ended.
The speech had been given in the Carnegie Hall—still after so many
years, the chosen forum for public discussions—and all through it
the young speaker turned his eyes constantly to the box in which the
Lorimers were sitting, not with too puerile an attention, but just
so much as would enable him to see the face of the lovely woman, and
catch from her approval, inspiration, for his task. His eyes were
not the only ones which sought that place, for Helen Lorimer never
seemed more beautiful. Her presence gave the occasion distinction,
though it was conjoined with the gratified recognition of the
aristocracy of Carrara. The new Mayor pleased them. He had been seen
often at the Lorimers, and the impression he made was admirable. His
intentions were suspected, and that very fact threw into his public
appearances—to them—a fresh interest. Not indeed that much was said
about it, and nothing was known.
It was understood in some indirect way, that the Mayor and Helen
Lorimer were together interested in the forthcoming trial, and
while Miss Lorimer’s social movements were rigorously watched, the
dispensations of good taste were not at any time forgotten. Her
splendid public activity belonged to the history of the times, and
the frequent presence of the Governor in her house, could be readily
explained in other obvious ways, than by the gratuitous assumption of
any more delicate relation, than the calls of the state. A group of
malcontents—those whose machinations with Longtinsky were suspected
by Helen Lorimer herself—and who belonged to the rich classes, were
very envious of the Mayor’s popularity with their own friends, and
viewed with positive hatred his assured entrance within the confines
of their social prestige and privileges.
Many men among them, and some women, convinced themselves that the
Mayor was a masked demagogue, at heart desirous of a political
revolution, that his clemency to the anarchists was a cheap trick,
and that his popularity was a menace and also his talents. To these
people Helen Lorimer, though the most distinguished member of their
order, was a dreamer and a dilletante. But some of them felt again
their own danger, from the probable exposure of their tricks and
conspiracies. The Mayor _was not_ popular with Theodore Lorimer.
Helen Lorimer sat in a box between her uncle and her mother at
the front, and a group of neighbors, in which a few handsome men
appeared, assembled behind her. Hats were not removed, and the
purple velvet Gainsborough exquisitely formed, and becoming her dark
abundant hair gave her a most charming effectiveness. As the Mayor
gazed at her from his seat on the platform, she became an Aurora,
this minute his own dawn, and the rushing years, full of work, of
usefulness, of conquests, the glorious endless day of Life. Never
before had he felt such gratitude for what powers he knew he owned,
and he fairly grew impatient to begin, that the tide of his powers
thus awakened might flow unimpeded—flow, as it were, to _her_ feet.
His heart sprang to his lips, and the words as if attuned to some
inner harmony of love, were rich with gracious melody, and strong
with manly thought. Mr. Briggs stood near the stage in a side aisle
with Tom Ratler, and it was amusing to note his slowly gathering
astonishment. His old doubts as to the character of the new Mayor
were surely giving way before the man’s manifest power, but Mr.
Briggs had still obstinately—perhaps a little vainly—clung to the
conviction, that it was he—BRIGGS—that shaped his ends, and lest
the Mayor should fail to understand this, Mr. Briggs plied him
more vigorously than ever with long winded speeches, and animated
apostrophes, and educational diversions. All of which the Mayor
with grace and good nature accepted heartily, though behind his
secretary’s back his smile prolonged itself into a wearied grimace of
forbearance.
The Mayor’s heart was not the only one stirred, not the only one
which beat with quickened pulses. Never did Helen Lorimer think so
well of him as then; she made the confession to herself, and she
made it with blushes bending, by one knows not what spell, to the
witchery and command of words—mere words—And yet—the Mayor was not
deprived of the charm of physical interest, though in his case it
was subtly wrought in with intellectual expression. His winning play
of features, the earnestness and beauty of his eyes, a peculiar and
native grace of motion in the tall lithe frame, and the constant
attractiveness of the ingratiating mouth, framed for speech, told
effectively upon his audience, and it was even fondly noted in its
details by one, whose lightest thought for him was priceless.
And in that sea of faces, on the occasion of this memorable address
of the Mayor, was a face belonging to one, who by the magic of the
destiny ruling the ways of men was drawn—not by accident, for there
are no accidents in the uses of fate—into his audience. It was Amato.
He was then still an occupant of the Anchorite, and had not yet
had the interview with the Cardinal, that we have just witnessed.
He was placed far up against the ceiling of the enclosure, having
walked through Fifty-sixth Street, and lingering for a minute on the
opposite side of the way, noticed the broad signs announcing the
speech of the Mayor. There was no room anywhere else in the packed
and eager house. Amato had heard of the new Mayor, and the fame of
his successful combination of warring policies in the last election,
winning the choice of the great city by his naïve but skillful appeal
to hostile parties. It had been commented on in the papers both of
Europe and the States. He felt curious to see this rising political
Cicero or young Alcibiades—as he musingly remarked—and so fought his
way up to the top gallery of the hall. And none listened with more
open and delighted ears than Amato.
Emancipating himself from the narrow seclusion of his student’s life,
responding intuitively to the power of personality and of talent, the
Mayor’s eloquence, the fine modulation and grasping insistency of
his voice, and the breadth and culture of his views, allied with a
certain artfulness of phrase, carried the young ascetic off his feet.
His applause was not very apparent, and one observing him might have
thought that he was not pleased, but the conclusion would have been a
stupid misunderstanding.
Amato became so interested, and so instinctively endorsed the Mayor’s
attitude that he forgot the customary tribute, and while others were
clapping, was himself revolving the Mayor’s weighty conclusions.
And it was just then, in one of the outbursts of applause, that his
wandering eye caught sight of Helen Lorimer, for she too joined in
the enthusiasm. She was far away from his lofty perch, but Amato,
awakening to the attributes of beauty, feeling the flourishing power
of his senses, and innately luxurious and tasteful, saw her, and
noted her charm. It was only after his interview with the Cardinal
that—as he arose from his slumbers the next morning—he consciously
identified the face he had seen at Carnegie Hall, with the visitor of
the Cardinal’s.
The industry of the Mayor was remarkable; he had begun a splendid
effort to reform the clerical service of the city, and to bring into
operation a new system of accounting. The enormous growth of the
city during the first half of the twentieth century had quadrupled
its debt, and made its yearly budget formidable. The outcry against
extravagance had been gaining in strength, and there seemed some
reason for it, though it was in a measure exaggerated by a popular
subserviency to the sensational mongerings of newspapers, and rabid
articles in the monthlies. The great city with its almost unexampled
generosity towards all sorts of public enterprises, its stupendous
educational system, and the vastness of its improvements, had indeed
assumed heavy burdens, reflected in a mounting tax levy. The century
had developed a strong tendency towards a hidden sort of socialism,
and while the organization of society was unchanged, heavy taxes
imposed upon the property of the rich and upon corporations, lent a
semblance of reality to the claim that the city government—and it was
symptomatic of municipal conditions throughout the world—had become
socialistic.
The Mayor confronted a discontented public when he assumed office as
the governor of the little municipal state. Capable and experienced,
and gifted with invention, inclined himself to view in a new light
the dawning tendencies of the time, which really urged a greater
participation of the many in the aggregate returns of the state, he
met upon his inauguration a double problem. He was expected to give
a business administration, curbing excess, limiting expenditures,
where they were foolish or unnecessary, diminishing waste, and also,
by some process of education, making the entire city realize that it
must succumb to the refreshing influences of an increasing desire to
advance the weal and general happiness, introducing—not recklessly or
with demagogic aims—an idealism of sympathy between all classes.
Helen Lorimer had herself engaged in the latter problem, approaching
it from the side of Class, with the strongest instincts of
Individualism, forming—if she could—an aristocracy of Worth, which
should assume a guiding hand in the control of affairs, and involve
itself in a perennial ministration of mercy and helpfulness. Unseen
to her there lay in all her thoughts the latent socialistic image; to
the Mayor that image was clearly seen, and attacking the problem more
from the side of the Commoner, he was never deceived or misled.
This community of serious interest had greatly heightened the flavor
of the Mayor’s acquaintanceship with Helen Lorimer. Their most
significant qualities of mind, had been mutually seen, and while they
very earnestly differed, there was no loss of admiration on either
side. More secretly and more profoundly they felt the collision in
themselves of two irreconcilable entities, the religious idea, and
the scientific idea. On that ground their tempers were inclined to
take fire, but the Mayor’s constraining love corrected his impulse,
and Helen’s slowly increasing surrender and engrossment oftentimes
closed her lips.
The evening of the fourteenth of July was spent by the Mayor at the
villa of the Lorimers’. The company—not a large party—ate in the
salon the reader has already visited, and perhaps for the first
time—or almost the first—some whispered conjectures were hazarded,
that the Mayor was decidedly interested in Helen Lorimer, while
eloquent glances told the same story. None of those present at the
dinner—with one exception, the count and his wife—at which Miss
Lorimer so boldly threw down the gauntlet of her convictions as to
the transplantation of the Pope, were this evening among the little
throng. It was most variously composed, though the young people
predominated; the few elders being well preserved old ladies, whose
composure it would have been dangerous for the younger set to have
disturbed by any frivolity. These old ladies were solid exemplars
of propriety, well dressed and effectively garrulous. The banquet
was an informal collation, the usual service of the young men to the
ladies prevailing, the latter sitting about the room, or, in many
cases, out of it, in such inviting nooks and retreats as offered less
surveillance for their coquetry and the interchange of vows.
In this confusion, amid the decorous collision of flying Ganymedes,
replenishing emptied plates from the overburdened table, the suave
exit and entrance of servants, the noisy expostulations of the
avid dowagers, and the murmurous tumult of comment, pleasure, and
platitudes, the Mayor and Helen talked alone at one end of the room.
Here they were soon joined by a shaking but emphatic old gentleman—a
Livingston—and a middle aged banker—a Gunther—whose cushioned
perfection of deportment, finish of address, and scrupulous attention
to the removal of crumbs from his attire, contrasted amusingly with
the older man’s carelessness, nervousness, and vituperation.
“You spoke well Mr. Mayor at Carnegie Hall,” it was the nervous old
gentleman speaking, “but you don’t use the meat axe—the meat axe—as
you should. I tell you Sir, that fine words never buttered parsnips,
and if you try pretty words on these socialistic renegades you’ll get
them back in your ears charged with curses. Hound them out—out. You
had no justification for interference. Let ’em hang!”
“But surely,” Miss Lorimer began, “Mr. Livingston you don’t wish to
be so unjust as to slay the innocent. I cannot think you aspire to
the detestable distinction of being a murderer.”
“A murderer, Miss Lorimer? The term can be given some meanings that
take away its reproach. War is not murder although we kill innocent
and guilty alike. Intimidation is worth more than just flat justice
in this matter. Besides in the case of pestilence those exposed to
the plague must be quarantined along with those who are sick. That’s
plain—very plain—and it’s furthermore plain to me that a new trial
means procrastination—compromise—escape.
“It’s futile—futile—Yes! it’s knavery to think of it!”
“Ah now,” this time the intercessory banker, “really Mr. Livingston
I think you mistake the nature of the evidence. Let us be
judicial—strictly judicial—the judicial course is the safest course.
It is sanctioned by authority and reason.”
“What! the Law’s way!” cried the irate representative of a family
which had given its members to the State and the Bench, “I tell you
Sir, the Law is the enemy of sense. It plunders our pocket-books, and
what does it give back?—demurrers and writs, and bills, and motions.
Martial Law, Sir I believe in, and martial law is the cure-all just
now. But your ordinary law, your court law—why! it’s a mouse in a
gally-pot—a buzz-fly in a pounding barrel! Surgery, _no_ medicine!”
The Mayor had not spoken; he was still seated watching with a
curious semblance of avoidance of debate, the face of Helen—he was
beginning to be audacious enough, softly to whisper to himself “his
Helen”—but now he stood, and turning to Mr. Livingston who was likely
to fly into a rage at his exasperating silence spoke, while at the
same moment Count Schinazi and his approving and inseparable wife
approached the group.
“Mr. Livingston you are afraid of the peace and permanency of our
State, because of these socialists, to whom you, on that account,
deny justice. Do you recall this fable of La Fontaine? A ruler of
a realm was told by the messenger of a hostile country that his
master could summon an army from all his dependencies whereupon a
wise courtier told the trembling monarch that it recalled to him a
vision that he had dreamt; he had seen a dragon with many heads and
only one tail on the other side of a hedge, and, thus affrighted, he
had stood dumb, and powerless with fear, when he saw that because it
had many heads it could not pierce the hedge between them; but, thus
recovered from his dread, the next instant he saw a dragon with ONE
head and MANY tails approach the hedge; this last easily passed the
hedge with all his tails, one making a path for the next. Mercy and
Justice to these misguided men Mr. Livingston will multiply the heads
of the movement, because it will certainly throw them into discord,
but Cruelty and Injustice will consolidate their councils into a
unanimity that can readily cause us apprehension. The Dragon with
many heads is harmless.”
The rejoinder was a little unexpected, and the irascible critic was
non-plussed, to recover however with the muttered ejaculation that
he knew a fable worth two of that, “the mouse who gnawed the nets of
the lion and let him loose”; at which the Mayor laughed, and Mr.
Livingston, shaking his head ominously, retired.
“Veery vell put your Honor,” it was the voice and grinning phiz of
the Count, “bit I tink de gentlemans who vas so, as you say, peevish,
might have, as you say, got you von better; vas it not a leetle like
dis, you haf de bone in de mouf like de leetle dog in de storie, and
ven you look in de vater you drop de bone to geet de shadow and you
loose bofe. Ees it not day vay?”
“I hardly think so Count Schinazi,” the mayor had made the
acquaintance of the eccentric foreigner and the two men rather liked
each other, “at any rate the bone is not yet _out_ of my mouth, and
if I am chasing shadows, we sometimes say rainbows, I am not likely
to disappoint any one but myself—or am I?” The last words were
directed to Miss Lorimer, and the smile and reproach that dawned on
her face again told the Mayor that he was something more to her than
a name and a friend simply.
Just then the voice of Theodore Lorimer was heard requesting silence;
there was an instant suppression of the social hubbub, and the same
voice told the company that if they would follow him they would be
led to the roof of the northern towers, where there would be music,
and a view of some few fireworks, and where there was also furnished,
upon one of the broader spaces a carpet covered square for the
dancers. This announcement was received with unconcealed admiration,
and the chorus of applause from the many couples, summoned hither and
thither from their coverts and hiding spots was overwhelming, causing
Mr. Lorimer to remark to a business neighbor “that Terpsichore was
probably a more popular deity than Columbia.”
The path taken by the guests led through a remarkable series of halls
and up many broad stairways graced with niches, holding bronzes and
marble figures, with walls decorated—not lavishly—with paintings, and
at the end of the ranges led into a spiral stairs, from which eyelet
windows covered the adjacent valleys. The hilarious company emerged
out upon a roof flanked by four towers, in a sort of uncovered room,
over which a trellis hung, carrying pendent vines, a summery pergola.
The towers flanking this space were pierced by doorways, and these
opened within upon narrower ascents, to the tops of the towers
themselves. In the centre of the room was the dancing carpet, and the
musicians, set to one side, already welcomed the guests with pleasant
melodies.
Almost the last to reach the outlook was Miss Lorimer and the Mayor,
and when they came, the place was in a surge of enjoyment; the
musicians breathed the enchanted measures of a Waldteufel waltz,
the dancers were noiselessly circling over the middle area, while
in all sorts of ways the rest of the group was engaged, in talking,
in rapturous comments upon the beauty of the night and the scene,
or taking restricted walks about the parapets. Helen Lorimer had
pressed forward, and, with the Mayor following, both with an unusual
eagerness, quite oblivious of the others, who for their part were
equally indifferent advanced to one of the tower doors, entered, and
disappeared.
An instant later Helen Lorimer came to the top—a round enclosure with
a low wall—and after her the Mayor. How was it that the woman put
back her hand, as if to assist him, and how was it that it was so
smoothly taken, and then—Oh you artful deities who watch such things
and watching smile—how was it that the man kissed it and kept it?
That kiss Helen felt, not alone upon her hand but very mightily upon
her heart; yes the confession rose to her, as with the sudden spring
of a concealed conviction, that, rushing in all the tides of her
being, she had hitherto shunned and repudiated.
The mounting color told the abject fact, though in the softly
illumined night, _that_ was hid from the man at her side, her
pulsating heart told the same story, though those rapid beats none
could hear but herself, certainly not he who seemed indeed dazed
with some dizzying emotion, for he left her side and gazed upward
silent. Nor was it alone the color in her cheeks, or the tumult at
her heart that thus miserably proclaimed her conquest; her limbs
proved traitorous, and the brave, strong woman sank upon a narrow
stone seating, that surrounded the wall, suffocated with her own
intolerable defeat. Defeat—yes in one way as women feel it—but after
the shock of surrender has passed, then the pent up tide inundates
the whole being,
_till strange love grown bold,
Think true love, acted, simple modesty_.
The Mayor came back to her side and standing there, leaned nearer and
whispered; “Have I offended you Helen?”
He had never spoken her name before, and the sound of it from his
lips startled her, with even a keener realization of the sudden
change in herself. And yet not sudden. The blossom that to-day
blushes on the branches of the rose bush means an inevitable process
of formation, a graduated range of growth from the tiniest bud to
its challenging beauty, the mute unfolding of an invisible yet
discreet nourishment that built up its silken petals, gave to it
its subtle fragrance, and painted it with colors blended from the
earth and sky. These steps in nature are not sudden, and yet when
the bush, that yesterday was but a wealth of buds, to-day is seen
laden with flowers, the change seems sudden—but it is SEEMS only; the
process unmarked by the eye, has taken time and if, with favoring
circumstances, with greater heat and light, it has advanced more
quickly, not a single step in its adventurous course has been missed
or skipped.
After his first declaration on the night of their conference in the
museum, the Mayor had withdrawn into a modest silence, though his
affections were clearly understood by Helen, and this diffidence
itself charmed her. His excellent mind, the powers of thought
that he showed, a peculiar earnestness, together with a reticence,
delighted her. He took pains to understand her projects and even
to criticise them. He did no longer conceal his own prejudices but
clothed in his ingenuous speech they seemed less dreadful to her. He
had a boyish way, blent with an extreme elegance of manner, a certain
distinction of address, and this favored in him a personal brightness
of appearance, hard to describe, but easily recognized. And then
their quarrels—why they so often dissolved in laughter!
It was on her side, Helen’s, a preposterous antipathy to the
scientific dryness and rigor of exact conclusions, on his, a humorous
enmity of too much belief in the unknown, a quiet skepticism that
showed itself unabashed before her intense appeals, and yet was
always unobtrusive. At times they did discover how far apart lay
their ultimate goals of tendency, and then Helen mourned that it was
so, and for that very reason loved him better. Her steadfast heart,
bathed in a deep catholic spirituality, wanted dearly to bring him
to her own standpoint of view, and in her prayers his name was not
omitted.
There were indeed moments when they rebelled against each other, when
they felt the chasm of a deep difference lying between them, and yet
why was it that even then they felt their arms stretched above it,
towards each other, as if to bridge and close it? In both there was
an inherent honesty that forbade compromise, and yet they were not
reluctant to hide their feud. Often it came to this, that the Mayor
said, he thought better now than he ever could have believed that he
would think, of religion, _because of her_ its precepts gained an
unexpected beauty. And they would both grow serious or perhaps both
smile, and in those smiles lurked the honey of an increasing love
between them.
And as for the Mayor the rich tide of life into which he entered when
with Helen Lorimer, her personal glory united with her elevation
of mind which his nature adored, her goodness, and the fine touches
of her delicate fancy almost swept him from his feet. He loved
passionately, and in spite of that he kept his footing, strained
to the last effort of exertion by his will, his dominant sense of
fitness, and by the call of his duties. He felt somehow that he even
maintained a supremacy in mind, and this helped him to abstain from
violence and entreaty. He felt too, with intoxication that the end
must come as he willed it, and as he felt that, the surges of desire
rising about him almost overwhelmed him.
They had seen a great deal of each other. There was the trial to
rehearse, upon which depended so much for the reputation of the
Mayor, and the overthrow of the enemies of order and the enemies of
justice. There were conferences with Mr. Moser the lawyer, who was to
open the new trial. There was Helen’s museum projects, and her new
plans of the Settlement House. There were broader, grander imaginings
of the Mayor himself, for the great city, to whose service he bent
all his powers, wedding it with the love that now controlled him to
the last fibres of his being. These plans were also revealed to Miss
Lorimer and discussed with her—how eloquently!—and her views sought!
And yet by the strangest of collusions there had been no gossip among
the news mongers, no whisperings in the public prints, no express
admissions in SOCIETY, nowhere any concurrent wonderings and guesses
and intimations. And all because both the Mayor and Helen had, in
their intercourse, admonished suspicion by their own discretions.
Both were eminent, and withdrawn somewhat in that fame, were less
carelessly discussed. Observation too passed beyond them to the great
trial of which now the general mind was full.
There was unrest in the city over the socialistic propaganda on the
east side, for though the office of The Beehive had been seized—Mr.
Briggs had attended to that, and Tom Ratler had been his good agent
in finding out the new location of the dangerous paper—no further
move towards its suppression had been made, and it was realized that
the turbulent organ yet maintained itself, and that an underground
circulation of its inflammatory appeals was going on, “making surer”
as Mr. Briggs said, “every day the eventual explosion and with rapine
and conflagration.”
There was some national alarm besides over threatened war, and it
seemed as if, for the last time, the convulsed earth stood on the
brink of a terrific combat, its elements shaking into compact orbs of
allies, whose circling collision would remake the civilized world.
But three persons in the huge city knew of this growing love. Helen’s
mother, Julieta, knew it and the Mayor’s mother knew it, and Tom
Ratler knew it. But not one of these could tell the others, Julieta
knew it, less by any visible witness, than by the safe conclusion
of her mother’s heart, and her woman’s instinct; the Mayor’s mother
knew it because her son had told her; and Tom Ratler knew it from the
moment he had seen the Mayor accompany Miss Lorimer down the City
Hall’s steps, and caught the Mayor’s eye following her vanishing
vehicle. With such as Tom, love is everywhere, in the daily air, in
each turn of the head, and a man not in love is a man not alive. Tom
was himself so dreadfully fettered, that his aching soul was only at
peace when he could see others in the same predicament, while his
mind, with a ferret’s ease, caught the faintest whiff, as it were, of
love stirring in the air.
And now Helen and the Mayor knew it themselves. It filled their
hearts, as a wine the chalice, but it could not stay there, for it
was a rising torrent and dauntless, sped to their lips and spoke.
“Offense? How can there be offense, if I could have wished it?” it
was Helen’s answer.
“Oh Helen, I have waited for this; I have prayed for it; it has come
to me in dreams, and when I awoke the dream, and the dear thing
I dreamt, seemed hopelessly far off and impossible. But no images
and riddles—let me tell you my whole heart, and now give to you my
life—all of it Helen; it is all yours, keep it, enrich it, make it
priceless, for with you in it, it will grow into something splendid.
“How wonderfully you have stimulated and inspired me during this last
month, I can hardly tell you. When I wrote, you were at my elbow like
a good deity, dictating, when I thought, you were before my eyes
lifting and sharpening my thoughts, giving them wings, and surely a
better grace. You know that my life has needed just this, and Oh! so
deeply!”
“Marston;” the words were softly uttered, but they were an
invitation, and the Mayor knelt quickly, caught the head of the
beautiful woman in front of him tenderly with his spread hands, and
drew it to his own, and their lips sealed again their vows, yet
unspoken, but now so acutely revealed and understood.
There was tumult enough in the Mayor’s breast, he felt delirious
with this sudden draught of joy, this burst of blazoning sunlight
amid the gray arduous fields of daily duty, and toil, and rivalry.
The poetic nature was strong within him; it had been sagaciously
apprehended by Mr. Briggs and that sage observer felt in it a danger
to the state and an inscrutable foe to his own complete possession
of his superior. In books, in stolen contemplations, the Mayor had
secretly fed his cravings, though the hard aspects of life, and
the unflinching tyranny of events had robbed poetry to him of much
of its meanings. And now like a flower revived by light, which had
been stricken into paleness and languor in gloom and neglect, this
ardent poesy raised in him its dropped head, and the new life pouring
through his veins brought to him an ecstacy that overpowered him,
like a gigantic wave of misery.
[Illustration: “HOW WONDERFULLY YOU HAVE INSPIRED ME.”
_Page 240._]
How strange it was, that here in the very garden of fruition he felt
the _darkening blight of storm_! was it his own timidity, or was
it the inversion of his own happiness, inverted by its own excess:
_dark with excessive light_?
The man seemed bewildered, and withdrew from Helen Lorimer, as if
shrinking from his own surrender or was it the doubt of his own
senses? But Helen Lorimer followed him, she put her arms about
his neck, she admitted her capitulation, and that same bright
intelligence, conjoined in her with a cheerful heartiness of
admiration, offered to him ingenuously her abounding love, for with
a nature so copious in feelings, so generous in givings, and so
spiritual, Love opened a landscape of delight:
_where the river of bliss through midst of heaven
Rolls o’er Elysian flowers her amber stream_;
and into that scene she walked, without misgivings and without
fear. “Let me confess too,” she said, “my life needs you. A woman
naturally shudders at the thought of loneliness in the world, though
I think God leaves no one quite alone, who will seek Him. But
then—ah then—it is something different; the meaning here with us is
part of the Great Plan,—and I have grown proud of you,—and—and—Oh
indeed I cannot live without you. I am yours—all yours.”
The Mayor’s arms caught her, their breaths and kisses mingled, and
amid the merriment below them, with the pulsing music keeping time
to their own heart beats, oblivious to the growing wonders of the
skies above them, they became married in thought and heart, while the
senses sent:
_A soul dissolving odour, to invite
To some more lovely mystery_.
The lights had become more numerous in the heavens, and the dancing
fires of the wavering or shooting aeronauts added a stranger splendor
to the air. And as yet no one came to interrupt them, no one indeed
missed them, so rapturous had all become over their entertainment,
while the singing violins and the sonorous cornets kept the dancers
busy. The young men were assiduous, and the ladies retentive, the
elders lost their reserve and attempted to revive their lost art of
charm and repartee, the dowagers were lenient, and in the swirling
gayety, though some anxious faces sought for Helen, none attempted
the pursuit, and the rumor gained ground that the Mayor had departed.
The Count Schinazi was in his glory. His witticisms were laughed
at, the girls declared his dancing “heavenly,” and as he glided
hither and thither, watched by his approving wife, the ripples of
enjoyment or hilarious shouts attested his success as a social card.
A sudden spit of fire above them, the swish of a rocket’s stick among
the trees below them, startled the spectators into a little cry of
alarm, and immediately the voice of the count brought them back into
composure and mirth:
“I tinks dat vas a fire-fly—von big American fire-fly. It vas as you
say, an up-to-date fire-fly, it vas a johnny-on-the-spot fire-fly—und
it vas a fine ting, ven the bugs, as you say, know their bizziness
und celebrat mit de peoples.”
An instant later a sharp crack emitted somewhere from the highest
southernward tower accompanied by a sputtering line of sparks,
surprised the gathering, and the huddled crowd watched with amazement
a shooting winding sheet of flame surround the pinnacle, rise, and
light a set piece of pyrotechnics at the top. It blazed, and the
whole pediment was brilliant with reflections while the space between
the towers became as bright as day. It banished the shades in which
the Mayor and Helen Lorimer had remained, and they were easily seen
standing together, and because higher up than the guests glaringly
lit up by the illumination.
There was no concealment now and they could even see the amusement
on the faces beneath, while to many there, and notably to Theodore
Lorimer, the picture of the two lovers standing unchanged, though a
little apart, was more interesting, more unexpected than the fizzing
showering eruptions of the _feu-de-joie_. With the safe execution of
this feature, the music was resumed and the dancers returned to their
evolutions, but something had thrown the comfortable festivity into
disarray.
There had been some fear about the fireworks, there was considerable
agitation over the discovery of the interesting relation of Helen
Lorimer and the Governor of New York. A good many “I told you soes”
cautiously gained a hearing, and some masculine hearts felt grieved
and injured. Theodore was a trifle vexed, Julieta smiled over the
accuracy of her premonitions. The night had advanced, the balloons
over the city had vanished into darkness, a storm seemed at hand,
and one by one, and in groups, the guests departed. Among them the
courteous bowing count, and his wife, and as the former pressed the
hand of Julieta his perennial grin contracted into an amusing pout,
and he said, casting a look of forlorn expostulation at Mr. Lorimer;
“Vell, vell it mek me, as you say a leetle tired; et vas most
onexpected und I tink it pit me—as you say—on de blink. I vas reddy,
ven Madame Schinazi tink she—as you say—fly de coop—to mek Mees
Lorimer veery happy meeself;” and so under a shower of reproving taps
of the countess’ fan the egregiously satisfied pair took their leave.
Long before this Helen Lorimer had descended to the roof parlor, and
with grace and confidence, though perhaps with a heightened color had
moved among the guests, while the Mayor who had descended with her
exhibited his own social skill, and though he found no Livingston or
Gunther to dispute or applaud his public actions, he found little
difficulty in securing attention, and, mastering his own impulse to
fly from the place, by pure desperation achieved wonders, engaging
old and young in animated conversation, testing his varied eloquence
to the best advantage, with much literary discretion and aptness.
To Miss Retruve, celebrated for short sonnets and addicted to
melancholy epitaphs upon her deceased pets, he pointed out the starry
firmament, where there lingered a few sky-rockets quoting:
_The skies are painted with unnumbered sparks,
They are all fire and every one doth shine_,
from Julius Caesar. To Miss Ballinger, well known for her amateur
theatricals, and a tripping desire to appear unalterably young,
and whom he found seated upon the parapet slightly above his head,
he quoted Romeo:
_for thou art
As glorious to this night, being o’er my head
As is a winged messenger of Heaven
Unto the white up-turned wond’ring eyes
Of mortal, that fall back to gaze on him,
When he bestrides the lazy-pacing clouds,
And sails upon the bosom of the air_.
To young Prentice, a youth who had won a Columbian medal for a
dramatic composition, he remarked, as both watched the speeding
aeronauts:
_through the purple night
I see cars drawn by rainbow-winged steeds
Which trample the dim winds: in each there stands
A wild-eyed charioteer urging their flight.
Some look behind, as fiends pursued them there,
And yet I see no shapes but the keen stars:
Others with burning eyes, lean forth, and drink
With eager lips the wind of their own speed,
As if the thing they loved fled on before,
And now, even now, they clasped it. Their bright locks
Stream like a comet’s flashing hair: they all
Sweep onward_.
And to Theodore Lorimer whom he found at the end of his touring
interviews he said, firmly gazing into his eyes equally sincere and
solemn:
“Mr. Lorimer, perhaps I owe you an apology, though, on my soul, I
cannot perceive that I have done any wrong. Miss Lorimer has given
me her troth, not I believe unadvisedly. I love her with my whole
being. All honor I have attained to, all I can gain, became immensely
enriched by her alliance. The denouement was sudden. I admit it. Am I
to blame? Do you blame me?”
Mr. Theodore Lorimer was a business man; he was also a widower, and
though no doubt he had had his love affairs, his demeanor to the
tenderness of life was a little austere and unbendingly practical.
He fully appreciated his niece’s talent and beauty; had a rather
vainglorious pride in the Lorimer family, and he estimated with the
keenest pleasure their exact wealth. His hopes with regard to Helen
were certainly indefinite, but he felt the Mayor’s humble origin, as
the phrase goes, and while he knew his ability, and his possibilities
of progression and promotion, he somehow yet stuck to that invincible
theory of caste, of class, the inbred feeling of separation. He
was loyal to American ideas, he was patriotic, but he treasured
the aristocratic formula—as indeed Helen herself did, but with a
difference—and he believed in making that aristocratic ideal a very
influential and beneficial factor in American public life, under just
those incentives reviewed in the earlier pages of this story. He was
not—to be really truthful—satisfied with the Mayor.
His family too was a Catholic one, and though creed offered no
rifts among the rich associates of Carrara it did sensibly suggest
an antagonism to a man like the Mayor, who was not of them, and
who had, in his earlier life, actually written a book upon the
needlessness of religion in the current meaning of the word. Then
he suspected the Mayor of socialism, which he thought already
tinctured unfavorably his own niece’s views, and socialism was to
Theodore Lorimer a monstrous sin. The very word brought a frown to
a face uniformly serene. He stood in a very close relation to his
niece since her father’s death, and with her mother constituted a
strict guardianship, which Helen respected, and, after the Catholic
fashion, filially honored. Besides, and in addition, he experienced
a vague resentment against the Mayor for the, to him, unnoticed
insinuation of himself in the favor of his niece. There was a
suggestion in it to Theodore Lorimer of something surreptitious
and vulgar, it contravened the dignity of the method he should
have preferred. Somehow it seemed to him that under the guise of
conferences—conferences which he had regarded askance, as in his
heart he had small sympathy with the end in view—about a public
question, the Mayor had succeeded in injecting a love mission which
was neither creditable nor desirable.
During the hour between the letting off of the _feu-de-joie_ when the
speaking isolation of the Mayor with Miss Lorimer was discovered,
and the departure of the guests, and the Mayor’s personal appeal,
Theodore had been working himself into a state of mind. This became
more bitter as he reviewed the chances—the matrimonial chances—his
niece could hope for. That extravagant and stupid idolatry, which
rich American girls suffered from, for foreign placards and names,
had greatly disappeared, at the beginning of the twentieth-first
century, although the ludicrous hunt on the part of impecunious and
wasted and morally unfit scions of noble houses for American money
still persisted. But the gloss dazzled, and the lure of name yet
exerted its malign and fallacious attractions. The malady had taken a
more aesthetic and reputable form. The offers from Europe were more
carefully scrutinized, and they were themselves less mercenary though
seldom could the taint of a money thirst be utterly excluded.
The Lorimers had been much in Europe, and Helen’s charm had gathered
about her many shining lights, handsome and striking figures in its
public and social circles, and none among these had to the observant
eyes of Julieta and Theodore seemed more acceptable than the young
Count of Monte Ferrato who had also shown his immediate interest in
Helen. Some such marriage would have frankly pleased Mr. Lorimer,
and while the matter to Julieta properly remained, as it should in
a woman’s thought, in the realm of ideation and emotion, she too
regarded the young foreign notable with partiality. As for domestic
unions, as Theodore said to Julieta, Helen “had the world to choose
from.”
The insoluble element was Helen herself; she neither leaned with
prestige or property, as might have easily been discerned. Her
Americanism was of the just type and she lived in ideals political
and religious, and the former sprang from the latter. Certainly
she had responded with appreciation perhaps to the admiration she
excited, but none of her adorers had touched these springs of feeling
which open a woman’s heart and win her. This was the bothersome part
of it to Theodore Lorimer, and while Julieta was amused, noticing
her brother-in-law’s vexation, she felt too the responsible task
of guiding Helen in her final choice, if she made it, and yet was
bewildered by the unusual nature of her daughter, which rather defied
coercion. She had endeavored in talking with Helen to get some
inkling of her feelings, but she only disconsolately admitted that
it was impossible, as Helen felt as yet no overpowering choice. With
that she dropped it, believing that Helen would take care of herself
in the great concern of her marriage, and having no inconsiderable
admixture of romantic sympathy in her own nature was content to leave
things to the God of Love, who indeed, while not infallible, does
adjust things of this sort fairly well.
So when the Mayor addressed Theodore Lorimer and corroborated the
shrewd suspicions which Lorimer had felt when he saw his niece and
the Mayor together on the tower, he simply said:
“I would like to talk this matter over with you Mr. Mayor. It is a
subject upon which I feel strongly and perhaps my views may not fully
coincide with yours. Will you please follow me to a room down stairs
where we may discuss it;” and whispering a word to his sister-in-law
left the roof followed by the Mayor, whose flushed face and bowed
head afforded some indication of his humiliation and disappointment.
While the two men, not moving together, but behind each other, thus
made their way through the scattered and departing friends, Helen had
resumed her neglected duties. She had been as active as the Mayor,
passing from person to person with greetings and caressing banter.
To Miss Retruve, whom she found in a giggling condition of pleased
vanity over the Mayor’s attention, she admitted that his Excellency
was “an admirable Crichton, really too dangerous for unprotected
hearts,” which caused that lady to contract her elongated physiognomy
into a map of smiles, and to remark, pointing her mittened finger
at Helen, “that men were deceivers ever,” which seemed to receive
Miss Lorimer’s assent, for she seized the probationary forefinger
and shook it desperately. To Miss Ballinger whose intense face was
fixed as it were, upon the upturned features of an elderly aspiring
suitor, and to whom she was recommending the Mayor’s gallantry for
his emulation, she said, while her voice shook with amusement;
_winter sunshine!
Beware of opening out thy bosom to it.
Lest thou myself, and all thy flock should catch
An after ague—fit to trembling_.
And to the dazzled Prentice who met her with adjurations as to “the
charming evening he had enjoyed, and the wonderfulness of their
Mayor, who was quite a literary paragon,” she said, passing abruptly
her handkerchief over her eyes, almost as if tired:
“Why yes—he is excellent in many ways, and I seem to be treading
his tracks among you all, reversing the old fable of The Hares and
Hounds.”
She left the budding dramatist, nursing his moustache, just as his
sapient fancy was about to remark—with bold originality—something
about the “observed of all observers,” and flew again further in the
thinning throng.
Mr. Lorimer led the Mayor to a room in the villa used by him as a
private office whose one window looked out upon the Kingsbridge road.
There was not much furniture in it, a large table littered with
papers, with a glass of roses decorating the centre, and filling the
air with fragrance, which to the Mayor seemed an imprisoned effluence
warning him. A painting covered the wall above the mantelpiece, and
this was the only important object in the place. It was a painting
of Robert Lorimer, Julieta, and the young Helen between them. The
grouping was conventional, but the art was unmistakable and the
drawing perfect. It was small wonder, thought the Mayor as his eyes
eagerly perused the big picture, that Helen was beautiful; the
ordinary course of heredity would have been strangely perverted if
from such parents beauty had not sprung.
It had been painted at the time (about the middle last of the
twentieth century) when there had been a temporary, but most
improving, return to the fashions of the beginning of the nineteenth,
when high collars with spreading tips and stocks, erect coat collars,
constricted waists, and voluminous scarfs, conferred an ancient
dignity to the imperial dudes. And with it, at least in this picture,
accorded the rich and flowing gown of the lady, like the dress of
Juliet in the play. The girl nestled upon the lap of her mother with
head pressed close to her mother’s knee, and with her face just
perceptibly turned upward. She was dressed in a light blue tunic-like
gown, and with a girl’s cap of a deeper blue in her dropped hand.
She perhaps had reached the age of thirteen, and her well moulded
features already showed a budding charm.
The eyes of the Mayor rested there a short instant only; a strange
tumult was rising in his breast; he knew that the man before him
would assail his pride, and that if a break came it would spell the
ruin of his happiness. Of that there could be no doubt, for he also
knew full well the sinewy resistance of his own nature, and how
quickly the fires of his heart kindled into resentment, when insult,
or rebuke, or any form of immoderate opposition stumbled in his path.
Not that he was unreasonable, but that he also was proud, with the
pride that was first born in him, and with some natural increase from
his life’s material success. Nor could he be altogether unconscious
that Nature had given him great gifts, that he had used them well,
and that office held its just respects.
Mr. Lorimer drew forward a chair and motioning to his visitor, sat
down himself upon the opposite side of the table which thus was
between them. The Mayor took the proffered chair slowly, and was
seated somewhat after his host. There was an awkward silence, and
then Mr. Lorimer who appeared flushed and a little disconcerted,
spoke:
“Your Honor, I think that I appreciate the compliment of your notice
of my niece, but I will bluntly say that I think that it is a matter
that should have been more deliberately planned. I knew nothing about
it until this moment and I believe that my sister, Miss Lorimer’s
Mother has not received any announcement of your intentions—or has
she?”
The Mayor answered readily and not without some sense of amusement:
“Why, no Sir—there has been none. In the nature of the case there
could hardly be any. I did indeed fall in love—as the phrase
goes—with your niece almost from the first moment I saw her, and I
confessed that feeling on the first visit I paid to this mansion—but
Sir, it has never passed my lips since, until this evening, when the
accidents which no one can surely foresee or prevent—even if it were
desirable to do so—accidents of voice, word, action—any thing—told me
that Miss Lorimer yielded to a similar feeling;” the Mayor paused,
and leaning forward continued: “Please do not mistake this for a
stupid, a ridiculous vanity; no one realized better than I do my
unworthiness of such a love, but I am not ashamed to claim it, not
afraid to assume all the responsibilities it means.”
“I fear Mr. Mayor,” returned Theodore Lorimer, who had not failed to
notice the flitting smile crossing the Mayor’s pale face, “that this
is not a subject for innuendoes, and certainly not for pleasantries.”
The Mayor felt his blood surging a little, and the evident intention
of his questioner became to his mind more clearly inquisitorial. He
looked up at the painting, and realizing the narrow formalism of the
man before him, and the wretched chances of loss now threatening his
joy, he mastered his impatience, and spoke more carefully, not indeed
without the accent of entreaty in his voice:
“I beg you, Sir, not to misunderstand or wrong me. No one could feel
more deeply than I do that innuendoes and pleasantries are out of
place in such a matter, and if you could see into my own heart, you
too would keenly feel how solemn and serious it all is to me. Before
you too hastily blame me will you not consult your niece, and learn
from her my exoneration, if you harbor any suspicion of my candor?”
Mr. Lorimer had hardly up to this moment kept his gaze fixed upon
the Mayor. He seemed to be talking to his hands, crossed on his lap,
though he did see by sidelong glances the Mayor’s expression, and it
had suddenly dawned upon him that the way to a rupture—and a rupture
was what he wanted—was through the Mayor’s pride, and he was pitiless
enough to try it.
“What do you mean, Sir, by accidents of voice, word, action; that
appears to me very much like innuendo, and if I was not mistaken the
smile on your face indicated your amusement.” As he said this he
raised his eyes and turned them unflinchingly on the Mayor.
The Mayor looked at Mr. Lorimer, and through his mind ran the
involuntary thought whether this man, who had become so closely
related to his happiness, had any humour, or experience, or poetry
in him. His scrutiny and his hesitation appeared to vex the banker,
and again he spoke with an acerbity that whipped the blood into the
cheeks of the Mayor, and brought him to his feet.
“My niece is romantic, idealistic, not, to my thinking, altogether
wise, in her plans or ambitions, and she readily can be influenced by
any suavity of word or ingenuity of speech.”
He could not go farther; the Mayor raised his hand, and with
authority interrupted him; “You wrong her, you wrong me, you wrong
yourself, you impute, at least by implication, Sir, that I have used
unmanly methods to win the good will of your niece. How unfair this
is until you know, until you have heard my story, and such tenders
of her confidence as Miss Lorimer might give you or, I think, more
naturally, her mother! There has been no trick of speech, no flattery
of voice, which is what I suppose you mean, but, what I fear is not
intelligible to you, a slow growth of affection between us, nurtured
no doubt by some identity of feeling, and common interests, as indeed
what love must not be?
“I must believe that you fail to feel that all love-making,” the
Mayor smiled perhaps bitterly, “is not the same, and that a formal
measure of the ways of love-making would make it all absurd. Pardon
me, Sir, but I believe this all should be left to Miss Lorimer.”
Mr. Lorimer resented the interruption, which began this speech, he
felt himself overruled, and he hazarded the inference that the Mayor
intended to have his own way, without much respect for him. He also
started to his feet. His voice was harsh and trembling, and a vein
in his neck, which was the danger signal of his excitement, had
seriously swollen;
“Mr. Mayor,” he said, “you are conscious that Miss Lorimer’s father
was my brother, and that he charged me at his death to watch over all
the interests of his daughter, my niece. I intend to do so, and I
have no reason to believe that Helen will care to set up her wishes
against mine. Miss Lorimer, as you too fully understand, could not
be a beggar on the matrimonial world;” the Mayor raised again his
hand, in protest, but it was not to enforce his desire to speak, but
in repugnance to the commercial words which had been used, and which
hurt him with their coarse meanings; Mr. Lorimer disregarded the
sign, wrongly thinking that the Mayor ordered him to desist; he lost
control of himself, and continued more violently, rashly, heedlessly,
cruelly:
“Please permit me to proceed; I say that Miss Lorimer has no
misgivings or need have none as to her matrimonial prospects, and
I consider it to be a duty I owe at least to her family, to tell
you that her hand has already been sought by representatives of
distinguished families abroad and in this country. Miss Lorimer’s
position is one which I think demands some consideration, and
that proposals for her hand should follow a less common, a less
precipitate course. You forget Sir that in such a case some etiquette
is imperative. Neither Mrs. Lorimer nor myself have been acquainted
with your intentions, and perhaps neither of us would altogether
approve of them. Of course—”
The Mayor’s voice broke in, he would brook no more, he was not
there to be rapped like a school boy, and that native repudiation
of ceremonial stupidity and artificial systems, the fires of his
strong radicalism, which often made him blind to the importance of
conventions, awoke in him, and put him in a rage. His voice, always
persuasive, sounded with an unusual vehemence:
“There appears to me no longer any cause for the continuance of this
conversation, as I find no excuse either in manners or reasons for
your observations. I love your niece; any and all things that a man
may or can do for a great love I am prepared to do, but Sir I am not
prepared to endure the intimations of a callous and a superfluous
Pride. Direct your servant to escort me to your entrance. I am not
likely to disturb you again. You may explain your position to Miss
Lorimer and—for my—own part—” the words fell slowly and with a deeper
hushed voice, “I will not invade her liberty, or stand in the way of
her social promotion.”
The sarcasm was not unfelt by Theodore Lorimer, and for an instant
he was irresolute. The next he recovered his calmness, and easy
politeness, and moved to the door of the room. He opened it, and
the Mayor passed through. Mr. Lorimer followed him, and the two men
without a word, threaded the stairways and corridors, from which now
the guests had departed, made their way to the entrance, and with a
still unbroken mask of toleration bowed to each other and separated.
The Mayor passed down the broad terraces of steps, and took his seat
in the automobile guided by Tom Ratler, and sped away. He never
turned his head to the stately palace from which he felt himself
driven, leaving behind him an incalculable happiness; but at length
he leaned forward on the back before him, and buried his head in his
hands, and when he reached his home he hurried to his chamber and
sank heavily on the bed. Something in him yielded and he had fainted.
The next morning Miss Lorimer received—handed into her at her
bed-room door—a letter which she quickly tore open and read; she had
begun to read standing near her mirror, and she had not read it far,
when she sank upon a couch, and even while she continued to read, the
color faded from her cheeks, and then returned with a mantling power
that made her look more beautiful. The words she read were these:
Dear Miss Lorimer:
I fear that I have made a serious mistake. I have
mistaken my own feelings. Forget everything, and let us be as
strangers. Our mutual interest in the trial will be now fully cared
for by counsel, and our further interviews become unnecessary.
Yours faithfully,
——Mayor of New York.
Miss Lorimer crushed the little paper in her clenched hands: her eyes
strayed forlornly about the large bedchamber filled with artistic
treasures and touched everywhere with feminine taste, and then she
arose. An embroidered night tunic covered her, and her unconfined
hair poured its floods over her shoulders, and it rose and fell upon
her breast with sudden quickness. Again she unfolded the disfigured
note, and reread it, and again she sat upon the couch, and her hands
dropped between her knees that pressed themselves together over them,
and the disconsolate stunned look came again, and again the color
came and went. Curiously her face turned to an etching hanging on the
wall near her, which showed the Duke Orsino of Twelfth Night, lying
on a couch, listening to a trio of musicians playing from a balcony
above him, and her lips seemed to repeat the inscription, under it:
_O spirit of love: how quick and fresh art thou,
That notwithstanding thy capacity
Receiveth as the sea, nought enters there,
Of what validity and pitch soe’er
But falls into abatement and low price,
Even in a minute! so full of shapes is fancy,
That it alone is high fantastical_
A hollow smile passed over her face, and the bewildered glance at
the torn sheet told of the conflicting thoughts racing in her brain.
And then with a sigh that made her for a moment steady herself at
the side of the cheval glass, where her form and _deshabille_ made
a picture which would have charmed the brush of a Bouguereau, she
resumed her toilet, and that finished, she went to the breakfast
table. She found her mother and uncle awaiting her. As she greeted
them she suddenly recalled that the Mayor had not taken leave of
her the night before; she had seen him leave the roof and had for
the instant attributed it to some necessary despatch of business
or the confusion into which they had both fallen over their mutual
confessions. But she made no inquiry.
Mr. Lorimer also had received a letter from the Mayor. It was the
soul of brevity; it ran:
Dear Sir,
Miss Lorimer understands my disinclination to
continue my suit. There need be no reference to our late interview.
Your etc. etc.
——Mayor of New York.
Mr. Lorimer had retired after his talk with the Mayor in a very
ruffled frame of mind, and, as it made him nervous and sleepless, he
charged his disorder and discomfort upon that unfortunate official.
The waking hours of the night only fortified in him a resolve to
prevent the union of his niece and the Mayor, and he determined to
hasten—were he successful in diverting his niece from this unwelcome
infatuation—Helen’s nuptials with some one to his mind more suitable,
and more agreeable to himself. The gentleman however understood the
strength of will in his niece, though with that was conjoined, as he
also knew, a tenderness of love and obedience, that he had often put
to the test.
But he felt uneasy over any discussion of the subject with Helen, and
he too keenly realized that his own discretion in the matter needed
her mother’s assistance, and this he prepared himself to obtain.
Her mother seldom, he knew, disturbed Helen’s “visionary schemes,”
but in some ways her influence upon her daughter was decisive,
and if—working upon these ideas of caste benefit, and the public
protection of an aristocratic superiority, which she preached—her
mother could make her see the importance of her reserving the union
of her family within a class restriction, his point might be gained.
The Mayor was an excellent man (even then Mr. Lorimer made
reservations)—Yes—an able man—Yes—a man with a future—Yes—but he
was a self-made man, a man of the people, and he was _bourgeoise_,
and that to the pinched apprehension of Mr. Theodore Lorimer was an
incredible predicament. As Mr. Lorimer had known very little about
any sort of Love, that ingredient in the problem gave him no anxiety,
though as a cultivated man he recognized certain poetic obstinacies
connected with a lover’s prepossessions.
When he opened the Mayor’s letter he could not repress a motion of
gratitude towards the writer; “Amazingly sensible,” he repeated;
“I will assure him of our political support,” and with a renewed
cheerfulness in his admiration of his own astuteness, the stilted
gentleman stepped into the dining-room, and after saluting his
sister-in-law watched for Helen’s appearance with undisguised
impatience. And, when she came, she seemed the same divine and
happy being he had always known; perhaps he noticed that she ate
but little, and seemed preoccupied, but that was mere physical
weariness. Surely this calm and serene being suffered from no
insurmountable disappointment. He had noticed that a letter directed
to his niece, had come in the morning’s mail, and doubtless that was
the communication alluded to by the Mayor, and the matter was now
settled, and after a little unavoidable regret—he concurred in the
popular superstition that there might be a _little_—everything would
be as before, and lest more dangers should arise, he would actively
prosecute his matrimonial intrigues.
As the three arose from the table—Mrs. Lorimer thought it had been an
unusually quiet breakfast, and detected the unaccustomed reticence
of her daughter—a servant entered, and handed Mr. Lorimer a letter
which he took with surprise observing, “Something from the Cardinal.”
The word caught the instant attention of Miss Lorimer and her mother,
and the two women paused as they rose from the table expecting the
announcements of its contents. It came with a delightful alacrity
from Mr. Lorimer’s lips:
“Cardinal Fenton sends me a good word for a young friend of his,
whom he wishes us to know. His name is Rudolph Amato. It seems he
had hoped to make him a priest, but the young protegée changed
his mind. He comes of a good Italian stock, originally, has great
wealth, and the Cardinal has expended much attention upon his
education. He solicits our consideration for the young man.” Stopping
to read further, Mr. Lorimer looked at his niece, and said, “The
Cardinal says you know the gentleman, Helen, that you met him at
his residence, and that Mr. Amato’s enthusiasm for the Church’s
prosperity is as great as yours, and that you should both make a
splendid combination for the sublime project—now resting in the minds
of progressive Catholics—of IMPORTING—those are his very words—_the
Pope_.”
To the questioning glance of both her mother and uncle, and with a
little renewed animation Helen Lorimer said:
“Yes. I met Mr. Amato at the Cardinal’s—a very handsome young man; he
has recently come from Europe. He was there in the interests of the
IMPORTATION question, and—Ah—” she ended, and clasping her hands over
her face she sank into a chair and broke into stifling sobs.
Mr. Lorimer left the room—this nervous agitation, he said to himself,
will end it,—while Julieta with tearful sympathy embraced her child,
and kneeled at her side pressing her own loving warm cheeks against
the face of the stricken woman, and yet, with a wise sympathy, asking
no questions.
CHAPTER XI
AMATO’S COURTSHIP
The summer was passing along and the hot days began their painful
visitations to the self-indulgent residents of Carrara. They fled
from the heat with varying speed, and, strangely, few fled to Europe.
The fashion of emptying New York, for the benefit of Europe, had
changed into a domiciliary fever for summer homes in the remote
and enticing counties of New England. The young, to see the world,
as the saying is, made their pilgrimage abroad, but even with them
the delights of the noble homes perched upon the Yankee hills, or
embosomed in their green vales, proved effectively more attractive,
and kept them in America. Many of the descendants of those who in
previous centuries had exiled themselves to European cities, had
deserted their foreign houses, and encamped again upon the domestic
soil, bringing with them accumulations of art and a somewhat
unamericanized habit of thought, expression and manners.
Living in the United States had indeed, in the year of grace, 2000,
reached among the rich much of that exquisite comfort, which had
distinguished it in Europe, enhanced by the many luxurious pleasures,
and expensive delicacies created by American ingenuity, wealth, and
fastidiousness.
The Lorimers were almost the last to leave the city. They had a fine
estate on the hills overlooking the sweet valley of Stowe, at the
foot of Mount Mansfield in Vermont, a place occupied a hundred years
before by the Tabers of New York. The wandering and comfortable house
hung on the edge of Cobb’s Hill, a broad large spacious villa on the
brow, looking directly against Mansfield, and over the wonderfully
varied and beautiful intervale of farms and woodland, hardly in
any way changed from its present aspect. The atmospheric charm was
scarcely less delightful than the rich abundant picture of physical
features, with the Hogback ranges to the east, and the sculptured
colossus of Mansfield in front, to the west.
Helen had expected some further word from the Mayor, and his utter
silence wounded, and abused her. She was left with no explanation of
his sudden change of will, no word of that reversal which she, in
her heart, believed was accompanied in him with pain and suffering.
It seemed to her so strange and indefinable, that she was willing
to attribute it to some psychological eccentricity, to a kind of
mental diversion, that she perhaps could not begin to understand, but
which she, by guessing a little wildly, saw, with certain nervous
and imaginative temperaments—and she knew the Mayor belonged to
these—might be an extravagant accompaniment (and outside of their
control) of their emotional make-up.
And yet——those words of love which sounded so sweet to her, which
seemed so sincere and fetched from an inward need, past doubt or
misgivings, how was it possible that they could be gainsaid? To so
quick an intelligence as Helen Lorimer’s the thought had not failed
to come, that her uncle might have interfered; that he might have
wounded her lover by some repulse,—and yet, though she saw this
possibility, by an interior conflicting pride, and desert too, she
would not mention it to Theodore Lorimer. Nor did that plotting
guardian say anything to her. He noticed the absence of the Mayor,
the abstraction and nervous reticence of his niece, and he safely
concluded that the best way out of this dilemma was for him, until
directly appealed to, to let things smooth their way as they would,
and the end would justify the means. For it was now clear to him
that the young protegée of the Cardinal more nearly met his wishes
and expectations for his niece, and he felt also, in his floundering
and stubborn way that Amato appeared at exactly the right moment to
administer consolation.
He felt that there was a necessity for that, and, without much
intuition in the matter—rejecting indeed any appeals to think about
it,—Amato’s various gifts, his cultured sympathy, his adroit and
incessant courtesies, his even gravity, not unmixed also with mirth,
and above all his splendid physical perfection, would, he felt,
increasingly banish the Mayor from Helen’s mind, all the more as that
obliging individual kept out of sight.
And though his dull perceptions cruelly deceived him at many points,
yet as nature is so made in us all, there was a practical and real
efficacy in the companionship of the young man for Miss Lorimer; and,
for the aspirations of the young man himself, her inward craving
for help—which at such crises grows very strong with vivacious and
intellectual natures——were favorable. And so it came about that while
the Mayor remained hid and silent, suffering his great hurt and
sickened in heart, the judicious spirits ruling over human affairs
advanced Amato’s suit.
And in the Mayor’s behalf there had been adjustments. A curious
succession of turbulence had startled the state. There had been
strikes and mass meetings of denunciation, on the part of tax-payers,
and the risings of a new party and an unexpected recrudescence of
Socialism involving a great number of discontented or unemployed
people, while beneath this again was the slowly seething leaven of
the anarchistic revolt, nurtured and spread by The Beehive.
The Mayor’s precocious mind grappled with these problems, his spirits
were brightened by just such conflicts, and he felt the renovating
ardor of combat. He saw—as Mr. Briggs already had seen, but with
a different spirit—the insurmountable tendencies of the times
approaching a broad cleavage in society between the well-to-do, the
generally contented, and a mass of workers, to whom indeed the world
did not deny the usual concomitants of satisfied existence, but
who, brought in sight of an overwhelming luxury and undreamed of
self-indulgence, experienced the pangs of envy, had begun to question
the reasonableness of the present social _status_. And joined with
these were a large body of men, holding the franchise, who were
inoperative and unproductive, largely weak and sensual, whose natures
craved immense satisfactions, to whom wealth had but one purpose,
just such satisfaction and who would welcome any change that might
bring within their uses the boundless aptitudes of money.
The aristocratic leaders saw the same thing, and some among them,
as Helen Lorimer, attempted to stem its progress by assimilating
the vast army of workmen, artisans, small shop keepers, merchants,
peddlers and street sellers into a group of admiring and enlightened
dependents upon the richer classes. It was meant that they should
realize the practical importance of the rich element in society and
becoming attached to it by ties of gratitude surround it with a
measurable force of protection, in case of its political attack.
With Miss Lorimer this movement was divested of selfish motives
entirely, and she worked under the inspiration of a true idealistic
altruism, conjoined with certain theoretical conceptions of a graded
and classified social state. Other aristocratic leaders actively
entered the service of the state, and proposed to use to its
uttermost the advantages of the franchise, assuming the adherence of
the conservative middle classes. This latter constituted the third
class—a class to which the Mayor belonged or at least from which he
had sprung—and which, by its instincts and the promptings of its
cool common sense and unimaginative acceptance of the substantial
limitations of life resented interference with its satisfied pursuit
of money, and its pleasant enjoyment of customary and legitimate
pleasures.
The Mayor had not lost his poise of judgment on account of his
disappointment, and the gnawing sense of humiliation, at the hands
of Mr. Lorimer, but, while he estimated the real value of a rich
society justly, and felt that the aesthetic and cultured aspects
of the city won an immense support from the rich classes, conscious
of their educational relations to the rest of society—as indeed the
aristocratic nuclei of the twenty-first century were themselves—yet
he relied upon the stubborn fixity of the _bourgeoise_ for the
stability of the state. To this latter element he addressed his
attentions, and he employed all the strategy and skill of a practised
politician, as well as an astute lawyer, and an eloquent advocate, to
strengthen his administration among them. He very narrowly watched
the proceedings of the legislature, and analyzed pitilessly all their
measures, exposing those which had the socialistic taint, and often
went to the extreme precaution of justifying his action in public
addresses. This was unusual but it proved immensely popular.
In the meanwhile all eyes were fixed upon the coming trial—set for
the beginning of November—of the incendiaries. It was generally
understood that there had been new evidence discovered, that would
liberate the accused and convicted men; intimations prevailed that
the Mayor himself had assisted in procuring this evidence, and that
he had been convinced of its existence by the famous philanthropist,
humanitarian, and scholar, Miss Helen Lorimer, herself a
representative aristocrat. Of course, this action displeased many of
the richer class, especially those who were themselves implicated in
the treacherous plot to destroy Longtinsky, by creating for him an
opportunity for mischief.
The conservatives among the middle class were about equally divided
as to its merits, and sagacity, but the socialists were immensely
pleased, and the more candid did not conceal their approval of
the Mayor. For the instant the Mayor attracted the attention of
the whole city in a very supreme way, and to a heart and mind
responding eagerly to the incentives of ambition, this popularity and
intellectual domination gave him satisfaction. For the moment, and
happily, these distractions served the purpose of repressing the
poetic, emotional, and dreaming proclivities of the Mayor, though
again too often he felt their intolerable cravings, and his smarting
heart kept him sleepless and despairing.
The repulse of the Mayor by Mr. Lorimer had defeated another scheme,
the murderous intrigue of Longtinsky and Poniatowsky. Longtinsky had
calculated that Miss Lorimer at the closing in of the foundations
of the new Settlement House, the plans of which had been published,
enclosing the novel idea of the Museum, would attempt some public
ceremony, and distinguish the occasion with an address. It was then
that he hoped to precipitate a riot, and in the melee actually
attempt her life, while at the same time a concerted rising might add
to the confusion, and—it was his deliberate conviction—lead to an
overthrow of the government.
This Clodian madness had been temporarily delayed by the
indisposition of Helen Lorimer herself, who ordered the continuance
of the building, but desisted from the especial corner-stone services
which had been at first contemplated. She longed to escape the city,
and the recurrent pictures of the gentle valley of Stowe, the morning
and evening face of Mansfield with its strong lineaments like a
sermon in philosophy and—unlike most sermons—made poetic by cloud
and sunshine, mist, rain and starlight, these, rising in her memory,
filled her with an insatiable longing; everything was hastened, and
at the beginning of August the Lorimers had set out for Stowe.
Young Amato had been well received at the Lorimers. It could not
have been otherwise; his introduction was influential, his own
talent prepossessing, his manner charming, and the essential
earnestness and a kind of dignified naïveté in the man, delightful.
Helen acknowledged his admirable address, and his style of liberal
Catholicism pleased her. A Catholic’s religion is an actual part of
his or her life; it is not placed outside of the daily transactions
of business or pleasure; in the devout it holds a lucid sway over
the motions of the heart and mind, and its admonitions neither
discourage happiness nor check speculation. Amato and Helen discussed
together very often the project of the Pope’s coming to America, and
for the instant this plan, looming larger and larger to her mind,
suggesting—it may be foolishly and vainly—immense moral consequences,
became a veritable comfort. She wrought it in her plans of social
betterment, into her designs for the religious awakening of the
state, into her dream of an established formulary for society, and
with true Catholic ambition—often incontinent and fatalistic—a
reorganized Catholic realm in the New World, free and triumphant,
bringing to earth new treasures of devotion and character, swam
temptingly before her mind.
And with all these blissful imaginings Amato was associated. Nor was
the association insincere. The same enthusiasm kindled in Amato’s
heart, and, with him, it mingled with his love. And both desires
added to one another their especial quality, which improved each.
Amato’s love became idealized, his religion gathered from the earth
the intensity and colorings of passion.
It was the last evening before the Lorimers, Helen and her
mother—Theodore Lorimer had already left the city—went away, that
Helen and Amato sat upon the tower’s roof, where the Mayor scarcely
three weeks past, had received her surrender. Helen Lorimer was
pale and silent. She remembered the very accents, and the voice and
words returned, as if syllabled by haunting spirits. How dismal this
desertion seemed. She stood up and moved about the little circle
along the edge of the parapet, and looked over upon the lights
beneath. The fire-flies sprang hither and thither in the trees and
gloom, shouts came up from the Kingsbridge road, and out over the
Hudson, somewhere beyond the dark wall of the Palisades, a shot was
heard. She swayed perceptibly, leaning on the stone railing and Amato
caught her tenderly.
In an instant the weakness passed, and she thanked him. His love
sprang to his lips. In the half darkness, for the young moon,
trembling in a vaporous sky, afforded only a transient light, she
appeared to him more beautiful than ever, and his own burning heart
beat impetuously. It seemed an enormity of carelessness not now
to say one little word! Hitherto he had been utterly impassive,
in speech at least, and his restraint had done him service in the
estimation of the proud girl. She had found him helpful, necessary,
and companionable. And he wondered—was this faintness in Helen
Lorimer, some feminine tell-tale yielding? He drew back almost giddy
with the sharp joy of the intoxicating thought. Ah! he knew so
little about women; that clouded past, its isolation, amid books and
students with a perverted intention! It thrilled him with wonder that
he had escaped it; he knew now, past peradventure, that if he had
surrendered to the Cardinal’s design, and this woman had crossed his
path, the war within him would have slain him. Did she wish him to
speak?
“Are you ill Miss Lorimer? Perhaps a little wine—?”
“Oh no,” she answered, “it is the heat of the day. It is high time we
were away!”
“Where is Stowe?” he queried, as they sat down upon the stone
bench, while over their heads whisking strips of light, from some
searchlight in the harbor, flitted right and left, and made her more
visible to him. Her hands were clasped to her throat and tears were
in her eyes.
“Oh I beg you Miss Lorimer, tell me if I can help you. To see you
unhappy hurts me so deeply,” he whispered.
“Ah Stowe,” she looked away, and her hands fell, and she turned to
him with a smile that made her tears more touching to the young
student; “Stowe is the loveliest spot! How much you will enjoy it; at
least I hope so for your own good reputation as an admirer of beauty.
From our porch a wide bowl of farmland and fields sweeps to the foot
of the western mountain—a singular rocky summit that seems a reclined
head staring immovably into the sky,—and when the sunset colors flame
and burn above it and the bowl of fields and farmhouses, begins to
grow purple and russet, in the fading day, and behind in the east,
almost as if above our house a reflected sunset repeats the west with
tenderer and chaster tints—then it is glorious. Not that exactly
either—then the place makes you strong and happy,” and the poor woman
bowed her head upon the stone and wept.
The worried embarrassed youth knelt at her side; he could have seized
her, held her face to his own with gentle and unyielding hands, and
kissed away the drops of her misery, that made his heart ache, and
yet brought to him—so his thought ran—assurance of her fondness for
him. The handsome man had no foolish vanity, no spoiled self-esteem,
and yet he was not unconscious of some merit in a woman’s eye, not
altogether unwise as to his power to entertain and help. His visits
to the mansion had been encouraged, he had talked with Miss Lorimer
upon so many things, which mutually interested them, had become so
familiar, even in the short three weeks, or slightly more, of their
acquaintance, with some of her fondest hopes, that he felt himself
somehow established as her admirer, and he had met no one else—as he
recalled—that might dispute that title.
Even as he knelt there, not touching her, indeed with no thought of
such a profanation, how odd it was that there suddenly ran in his
head Malvolio’s stupid conceit, and the words of the confessed fool:
“Why every thing adheres together, that no drachm of a scruple,
no scruple of a scruple, no obstacle, no incredulous or unsafe
circumstance—What can be said? Nothing that can be can come between
me and the full prospect of my hopes.”
Amato sprang to his feet. He felt disgraced with this fulsome self
flattery; could it be possible that he followed this new master Love
with so ignoble a confidence?
“Pardon me Miss Lorimer,” he said, “if you will let me bring you
something; perhaps—”
“No thank you—a little nerves, that’s all. You do not know American
women well Mr. Amato. Our cruel climate makes us less stalwart and
invariable than your European ladies.”
“It amuses me Miss Lorimer;” Amato cheerfully replied, “that you
assume I know anything about European ladies, and the disadvantageous
comparison you make, seems to me unfair. Are not ladies much the same
everywhere?—I mean as regards sensibility?”
“How very unflattering!” Miss Lorimer was smiling again, and she rose
too; “You should not make the mistake to regard us as all cast in the
same mould. Would you care to be confounded with all your fellow men
by an indistinguishable sameness?”
“Don’t be so hard with me. The question was whether American ladies
are more susceptible—more sensitive, I mean—than European ladies.
I have rather been led to think that while American women are more
sympathetic, they are quite as self-possessed.”
“Well we won’t quarrel now about ladies and that life-long difficulty
of telling just how much we are superior to our European sisters. You
know we intend to keep you at Stowe, and I shall put to the test your
strength and patience. I must be out and walk; and your assistance
will be much insisted on.
“I shall be surprised if you are not disappointed with our small
mountain. Don’t look for a Matterhorn and glaciers. Our pretty
country side is hardly dramatic, and the people are not costumed
guides, nor are there any titled tourists.”
“Why Miss Lorimer,” answered Amato laughing heartily himself, “one
would think that you take me for a foreigner. Have I not been all my
life in this country? Is it not mine? Please remember that I was born
here. Europe is more strange and unknown to me than it is to you.”
“Well there is the continental air about you somehow. After all it is
the blood rather than the atmosphere that makes race. When we say
blood what do you mean really?”
“Everything that goes to the making of this body and with it the
mind. It cannot be the red corpuscles alone. Blood means temperament
and temperament means after all just so much nerve and muscle and
flesh and bone, and because all flesh and bone is the same the
differences come in the putting of it all together, as you make
different patterns with the same thread.”
“Perhaps,” said Miss Lorimer, “it’s something like a difference in
air. The chemist tells us the air all over the globe, top and bottom
airs, yields to his analysis the same proportion of oxygen and
nitrogen, and yet how to our finer sense they vary, and how one air
kills, and another revives us,
_like the sweet south
That breathes upon a bank of violets
Stealing and giving odour_.”
“Heredity stamps differences in us, and occupation or custom
strengthens them,” said Amato.
“Science, if this is science,” answered Helen, “explains very little.
You know Amato,” the young man started with this gentle familiarity,
“I scorn science. In a bad sense it is the great deodorizer; it
expels the perfume of every thing. In its grand role of making things
plain, it makes them common. It labels, and classifies, and sticking
names on all creation converts this mysterious and lovely world into
a huge encyclopædic catalogue. Oh, it is an old quarrel with me;” she
bent her head once more, for the thought of her serious arguments
with the Mayor returned and grieved her.
“It is pretty certain,” said Amato, “that science utterly fails to
explain anything fundamentally. Its Laws, so much boasted of, are
superficial rules which never go the smallest fraction’s depth into
the meaning and nature of things. We are less frightened than once,
but we are not the least bit less amazed.”
“That suits me, that suits me,” cried Miss Lorimer, “Ah Mr. Amato for
you and me, is it not permitted through our Faith to feel
_that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity, may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it has its being, and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will share?_”
“Well! the vision grows in these later days, and I believe that
Science must be thanked for much. Lucretius said that as boys fear
many things in the dark so men in broad daylight have been afraid
of the future, and their lives, but that reason will dispel these
foolish fears as the sun or the lamp the darkness that scared the
boys. It is so.
“We must be duly thankful for the emancipation of this day from mere
stupidity.”
Miss Lorimer watched young Amato with an increased interest. She
certainly felt that she was admitting his friendship to a more valued
place in her esteem.
“Oh yes—stupidity is always hateful, when it blots and disfigures
thinking. But science in another way is stupid too. Its style of
knowing it all, its preposterous agnosticism, the patronizing air
of its professors, its denuded common senseness, the literal manner
of its assertions, and the blank stare it offers to all poetic
meanings—its absorption in names and guesses!
“And indeed what of it? If we think we know the way the world
was made are we any better off? We rejoice in some interesting
propositions and some men derive a few worldly honors for their
sagacity. It employs time and research and indefatigable brains, but
suppose it weakens our quality of aspiration, of religious hopes, of
contented living, of wondering joy in the mysteries of things, are we
the gainers?”
“I believe that science as a whole saturates our present life
quite favorably” said Amato, leaning with arms crossed against the
parapet and looking towards the southern city. “It advances along
so many lines of sane living, and marvellous conveniences! It is
not only that we have perhaps a new way of thinking—which you and I
may deplore—but with these new ways comes in a flood of inventions
which make living safer, longer, more delightful, and give us, for
instance, that miraculous light that to-night seems almost a message
from Heaven.
“The old latin and grecian philosophers guessed and wondered, and we
are told learning was much a littering of thought with systems of
whys and wherefores. But nothing certain. To-day if we are as far off
as ever from knowing the _Altogether_, perfectly, we are infinitely
nearer seeing the complexity of things, and the adjustments, the
checks, the rearrangements, the vast economy, the deliberate purpose,
the balance of creation, and so, without guessing, we have an
absolute gain in knowledge, and, like visitors to some beautiful
garden are IN it, and no longer OUTSIDE of it.”
“But all this increase of knowing does not change your Faith?”
queried Helen with animation.
“No,” said Amato “it does not. The habit of belief has been fixed in
me. But somehow I think that the area of faith grows less and less.
Lake a vanishing surface in a flood it is inundated on all sides. The
rock of resistance is our Church, and to that as to a very citadel of
safety, those, to whom religion is life, must flee.”
“_They must_,” rejoined Miss Lorimer. “And Amato” again the young man
resisted the impulse to seize the speaker’s hand, and confess his
soul to her, there in the quiet night; it almost seemed to him as if
she paused, waiting for him to take the offered chance—she continued;
“if this vanishing is a fact, is it not the part of wisdom, is it
not a supreme duty, to concentrate the army of believers here in
this country, where Catholicism wears the cleanest face, is the most
pure and radiant, lives up, I think, to the highest standards, and
nourishes a brighter flame of devotion?”
“I know what you refer to Miss—Lorimer,” said Amato “the bringing of
the Pope to this country. Well are we not both agreed about this?
The Cardinal told me but the other day that the plan broadens, and
grows, that the fathers of the Church are turning their eyes to
this country, and believe that in the slow subjection of the Church
in Europe, its losing hold upon influential thought, that the Pope
should come to America.
“The Cardinal says it would mean a new chapter in the Church’s
history—he calls it the Church’s DEMOCRATIZATION, for the Pope in
America would simply be a ruling Bishop, though yet the reigning
semblance of Christ on earth. Instead of a throned monarch he would
here become a citizen, and, while screened within the decent guards
of privacy, he would put on the expression of our common equality
before the Law. In this country, says the Cardinal, must come the
final apotheosis of the Church, from these shores it must rise into
the opening firmament of the WORLD TO COME.”
“As if” continued Helen, seizing his thought and finishing it, “the
Beatific Vision should culminate on these shores, before
_The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherits shall dissolve._”
Helen Lorimer’s face glowed with a strange beauty. Amato could see
in the half light—he was so near to her—that her eyes half filled
with tears, and the long dreaming gaze taught him the religious
depth of her nature, and, as she rose, and offered him her hand, and
she came close to him her loveliness shone in his eyes like some
transfiguration. She said; “Yes we all shall work for this. What a
triumvirate of plotters we shall make. Ah!—Well to-morrow even at
about this same hour, you shall see the HEAD at Mansfield watching
the skies, waiting like some bound and wearied Prometheus for the
day-star of perfect Truth to set him,—and _all_ free.”
“Miss Lorimer,” it was Amato speaking, and as he spoke he slowly
dropped her hand, “There are fetters besides Ignorance, and they are
bonds which I would not exchange for Liberty.”
Helen Lorimer had passed to the top of the stairs, leading from the
tower, and she turned to him, and on her face there rested he thought
a smile, as if she understood and wished him well. And now it came
to his mind, with an alacrity he wondered at, that through all the
time he had enjoyed her acquaintance she had been so grave, at times
a great vividness of speech, a rapid interest in things, almost as
if seeking a distraction—but always grave, perhaps sad—and now—this
keen smile as if joy came to her! It made his own heart leap, and the
blushes of delight flamed his cheeks. He felt his pulses quicken, and
something choking his throat stopped his voice. He almost ran to the
top of the stairway,—but she had vanished. He heard her calling from
below:
“Come! Come! We must start early to-morrow. Good-night, good-night!”
The next day Julieta, Helen, and Amato, took the White Mountain
Express for Vermont. The party attracted some attention at the
splendid Grand Central Depot, for Miss Lorimer was known, her mother
was yet a most beautiful lady, and the handsome beaming face of Amato
set tongues wagging, and did not fail to draw the eyes of ingenuous
maidens.
The trip was a new one for Amato, and he noted with studious interest
the changing rushing picture, which indeed Helen had commanded him to
observe, saying: “See! if we are not almost as good-looking as you in
Europe,” a reproach to which the young man vigorously protested. But
he obeyed devoutly, and let nothing escape him.
From New Haven the country grew increasingly interesting; the wide
fluviatile valley of the Connecticut River, with here and there
separated and towering meridional ridges of Triassic sandstone, was
very striking, while the testimony of enormous erosion and decay
was seen in the clay pits, all the way to Hartford, and beyond to
Springfield, and further. From Springfield they shot, on an arrow’s
wing, past Holyoke, and Mt. Tom, with its lonely surmounting hotel
(still maintained), past Northfield, with Moody’s ancient camp, and
then to Bellows Falls, which makes such a bright picture!
From Brattleboro, Windsor, to White River Junction, the charm of the
Connecticut was always with them; hundreds of the loveliest scenes
were encountered, and the varying phases of the river kept his
attention brimming over with pleasure. Charming homes appeared from
time to time, opposite pleasing or noble stretches of the river, and
Tobacco was a noticeable product, growing with great luxuriance in
the river farms.
From White River Junction they travelled to Waterbury. This ride
through a long turning and returning valley, quite closely hedged
with hills, lanes, and old beaches, was also delightful. The day
grew gray and rainy, and much of the beauty of this ride through the
lonely cold vales, with the compact little villages was lost, but the
wild and frugal life of the people, the keen set look of the country,
and the ever present strolling or rapid river were well seen. It
was the same as to-day, for that prevalent desertion of the country
for the city still prevailed at the beginning of the twenty-first
century, indeed the cities grew with startling ease, and the country
put on a new forestation, which renewed its ancient woods, and
brought back, with strange quickness, its wild animals. One thing
alone counteracted this tendency, and that was the increasing pride
of the rich in the country. They scoured it over for beautiful sites,
and revelled in giving to the broad acres they bought, a ravishing
pastoral charm. It was not unnaturally allied to that aristocratic
effort of establishment which we have referred to, and which Helen
Lorimer so much delighted in. She said herself; “if the rich, the
cultured, those who know the arts of living, will root themselves
in our country-sides, and spread beauty and elegance of rural grace
about, benefitting little communities with the application of
their wealth, ennobling natural views and places with expressive
architecture, weaving everywhere, like scarfs up hill and down dale,
good roads, that will throughout make living safer, easier, and more
delightful—if they will do this, they would justify their existence,
and they would surely become better Americans. They would truly love
their country.”
The movement had grown and distended itself, actuated by a new
sudden contagion of enthusiasm and the growth of emulation. It had
made whole sections of New England, and parts of the rural New York
counties marvels of loveliness. It ransomed from commonplaceness many
spots which needed only the touch of an artificial embellishment
to become pretty. It created the most fascinating surprises, where
ingeniously designed villas on hill top and spur, in valley and by
lake side, gave to the landscape a borrowed European air while at a
thousand points the nestling colonial homes, like the most delicate
visions, sprang to view with positive enchantment.
The most fortunate rivalry had arisen between states, and the rich
entered upon the most profitable sort—for the public’s benefit—of
competition. They strove to make their states attractive, to give
them an unusual beauty, and in this friendly and delightful contest
added new incentives to all the occupants of the state to support
them. Schools of Artifice—as they were called—came into being, each
having for its aim the development of a spirit of aesthetic ambition,
and the peculiar use of the features of the state, so as to produce
the best picturesque effects. So there had grown up a stronger demand
for beauty, and it began an almost despotic sway in the living of
men. It influenced the most humble and chastened the most vulgar. In
the cities it assumed such grandiose forms as the monumental splendor
of Carrara in New York.
It had touched the South, where it was indeed most needed, and the
old time slovenliness and dreary hopelessness of board and brick,
flatness and indifference, succumbed to a sprightlier fancy. The
South had become rich also, and this allowed its owners to resume the
old time princeliness of the Virginia colonial style, and so through
the devious changing beauty of the Appalachians, from the Potomac to
Tallulah, art swept its redeeming hand, and blent its best effects
with nature’s unharmed loveliness.
Mr. Theodore Lorimer had everything in readiness, and being something
of a manager, besides an almost acrimonious critic of conveniences,
the house and grounds of the Lorimers at Stowe were in perfect shape,
and the place wore its most fascinating guise.
Mr. Lorimer had suffered, though a selfish arrogant and narrow man,
some qualms of self-reproach over his treatment of the Mayor, and
his own obstinate concealment of their interview. He really feared
his niece, and any explanation to her of his conduct would he knew
precipitate a difficult situation. He avoided that. He realized
Amato’s helpful influence, and while his dull and sluggish spirit
lamented, in a torpid way, Miss Lorimer’s evident suffering, he
believed too much in the remedial and—as he thought—easy application
of the young man’s gifts.
But his gnawing sense of self-dissatisfaction—an unusual feeling
with Mr. Lorimer—sought relief in his own stricter efforts to please
and divert her. So he had taken great pains to have all things at
the Stowe villa in apple-pie order, and long before the family had
expected to leave New York, he had come up to the place, and made the
elaborate preparation in flower beds, trimmed outlooks, and cleaned
and painted rooms, with a few added pictures, a few new rugs, some
jardinieres, a set of new curtains, a dainty new setting of a little
veranda tea room, polished floors, some exquisite china for the bed
rooms, and a pergola with seats, where the sitters could see the
wide vale, dimpled with farm houses, and the peaked ridge of Mount
Mansfield. All these things betokened the man’s tenderness for his
niece, and the injurious sense of his own perfidy towards her.
He had exerted himself to be agreeable to Amato, and he showed his
personal pleasure in the young man’s visits. His encouragement had
been pleasantly assisted by Julieta’s address and winning welcome.
Amato had been careful not to overstep the bounds of an admiring
attention. He had been reticent and simply friendly, but in a hundred
ways his love expressed itself less obviously and, because Miss
Lorimer herself had shown the restraint of some pre-occupation,
he allowed himself only the formal privileges of a friend. His
conduct was adroit and delicate in its union of respect and the
warmer qualities of devotion. All this had its sensible effect upon
Miss Lorimer, yet she remembered the Mayor with an almost unshaken
attachment. The first harsh wound had healed, and her pride—perhaps
not so truculent and preservative as with less gentle and less
distinguished characters—had come to the rescue, as it always does
with women who possess it, as a gift from the armory of nature’s
prudent kindnesses. In this expectant and refined relation of hope
and preparation, of withdrawal and insistence, of sympathy and
regret, the matter stood when the Lorimers came to Stowe.
At length an auspicious day late in August dawned, after a throng
of thunder showers had swept over the country side, when the ascent
of Mount Mansfield could be made, and the clear lucent atmosphere
enjoyed, for a perfect view from its rugged summit.
The party which left the villa consisted of Julieta, Helen Lorimer,
Theodore Lorimer and Amato. Mr. Lorimer and Amato had at first
stipulated to go on horseback, but were overruled, and the party
left Stowe in a large carry-all in which Mr. Lorimer stowed away some
viands and liquids which he said “would do well enough to help out
the resources of the Summit House.”
The carriage bowled along the hard road, over the barricaded bridge
above the little stream that crosses the valley, and on across the
smiling vale, while Mr. Lorimer detailed the past history of the
place, and pointed out the expanding lineaments of the mountain.
Stowe, he told them, a hundred and more years ago had been a great
resort with a handsome hotel, burned down somewhere about 1895,
how it had been deserted and sidetracked by more ambitious places,
how a Mrs. Taber had come to the valley enchanted with its beauty,
and how her talented son, whose life had been actually prolonged
in these salubrious airs, had designed the house the Lorimers then
occupied,—so that the house was something more than a hundred years
old,—how that the returning sense of the delicious beauty of the spot
had brought back to it its old time prestige, and that now to the
left and right of them were farms owned by rich proprietors whose
houses he pointed out with much assiduity, as they could be discerned
rising among groves of trees, or were momentarily seen through
openings in the woods.
At last they began, under the very shadow of the range, the long
ascent and steadily rose, with many glimpses backwards over the
country, the village of Stowe—like a toy hamlet on the horizon—and
the far eastern range of Worcester. Finally after many turns they
came directly under the lee of the high rocky cliff, which is the
nose of the great face of rock, which fancy has formed from the
regular upraised pinnacles along this steep and elevated ridge. A
last long pull and they were at the doors of the Summit House.
Some of the day yet remained and after a slight refreshment Helen
and Amato—the work involved seemed too strenuous for Mr. Lorimer,
and Julieta absolutely refused—started up the Nose in a stiff gale
that made mutual assistance imperative. Helen likened it to climbing
the Pyramids, for the schistose rock was hewed out in terraced
steps. From the whistling peak of the Nose they could see the mimic
configuration that, in the distance, as seen from the valley looked
so much like a countenance. First to the south, the Forehead, and
then this beetling perpendicular mass of rock forming the Nose, then
the long Upper Lip northward, the Lower Lip—both made by projections
of rock somewhat superficially broken up into irregular heaps of
fragments—and finally the high upthrown Chin, and the receding throat
with an Adam’s Apple, made by a conical elevation.
The day was shutting down, a flying scud of mist speeding over the
Chin, and the outlook was discouraging for the morrow. The excited
visitors did indeed return to the level of the Summit House, and
then, in a rising gale, struggle on to the towering eminence of the
Chin, but the clouds closed down, and the dragging tails of mist
flung their moist wreaths around them, and effectually drew the
curtains of concealment all about them, and so they hurried back over
the tilting and pebble strewn upland path.
The next day opened ominously, and Helen, who was awake early to
catch the first glimpse of the sun rising over the Worcester hills,
was disappointed. She met Amato wandering over the mountain top. They
both stopped a little while to talk, commenting on the strangeness of
the silence.
“Just silence itself imparts a feeling of grandeur to places,” said
Amato, “The banishment of all sound affects one strangely, as if we
were no longer in the world.”
“I think it is not the silence alone that does so, but that lift from
the world that the mountain gives,” answered Helen.
“How unusual the voice sounds too here, as if its lightest tone was
megaphoned into a shout.”
“There is a great echo up here further north, where the sounds are
redoubled. It is weird enough when a cornet is played softly and the
slowly emitted notes chase each other, with others rising to the
call, as if a troop of invisible spirits sprang tiptoe from their
hidings, and flung themselves upon the man-made note to destroy it,
or else, one might think that they were freed voices, liberated by
the human call, to rush on forever and forever round the world.”
“You remember Wordsworth’s beautiful lines?” queried Amato.
“_And they would shout
Across the watery vale, and shout again,
Responsive to his call—with quivering peals,
And long halloos, and screams, and echoes loud
Redoubled and redoubled; concourse wild
Of mirth and jocund din._”
“Hardly so, though that is indeed most enchanting. Something more
idyllic and classic came to my mind about them. As if these echoes
were silenced voices waiting in the crannies and crevices of the
rocks for their resurrection, an aerial life to be given them by the
human call they were fitted to answer. How harshly science robs us of
all such fantasies!”
“And yet science delivers to us too a delightful image,” said Amato
“for it permits us to imagine the invisible waves of sound dashed
upon these hard rocks to be returned in reduplicated billows just as
we watch the refluent crest thrown back from the headland on the sea.”
Helen had risen from the stone boulder, from which she scanned the
circling fog wreaths around, and as she turned towards the Summit
House a splinter of light seemed to fall at her feet;
“The sun” she cried, “it will break away! We shall have our ramble!”
They returned to the House for the breakfast, which the consideration
of their host and the watchfulness of Mr. Lorimer had made inviting.
The table was set with early asters picked up lower on the mountain
side, and scrambling stems of the Bitter-Sweet with the orange cups
and red coral arils twined about the centre of the table. The temper
of the place was happy and exhilarating, and the company partook
of the infectious gayety which seemed to be a part of the pure
and sparkling air. For the morning, after the preliminary period
of distrust and uncertainty, had cleared, the mist rolled up into
clouds, the blue sky appeared, and the direct sunshine struck sharply
down, and from the windows the whole ridge, from the Nose to the
Chin, appeared in its unbroken extent.
Mr. Theodore Lorimer and Julieta were both in a happy vein, and
the isolation of the summit, inwrought with the singular power of
mountain tops to elicit a healthy hunger, made the morning meal
delightful.
“I almost feel as if we ought to hire this Summit House, indemnify
the landlord for losses through our monopoly, and make a stay here,”
said Mr. Lorimer, “it seems so interesting and unusual, and it is so
far away from worry.”
“It feels almost as if we were off the earth in a balloon,” said
Julieta.
“Perhaps loose on a whirling Meteor, would suit the case better,”
said Amato laughing.
“Yes,” responded Helen with animation. “We are. Just a bit of a world
all to ourselves, and near enough to the old one to still see it.”
“A satellite so close to the earth as that Helen will surely return,
we shall not be able to keep off long,” said Mr. Lorimer, looking
curiously at Amato and his niece, as they sat together on one side of
the table.
“But if we do,” continued Amato with a smile on his bright and
handsome face, “the thump we make when we come back will furnish
the newspapers with some terrible headlines, not to speak of the
astonishment Miss Lorimer’s admirers among the reporters will
experience to find her on the whisking asteroid.”
“If we should strike New York the Mayor would have no more problems
to consider,” said Julieta, and the speech was unfortunate. Even
Theodore Lorimer sent a glance of mute protest and rebuke to his
sister-in-law. Julieta meant it most innocently; she was one who
had realized Helen’s love for the Mayor, and she had noticed with
astonishment his absence and Helen’s pre-occupation. But she rather
favored Mr. Lorimer’s view, and she had thought the affair—as the
phrase goes—was a mistake. Then she was attracted by Amato who
had won all by his frankness, and ardor, and gentle reserve, and
then—well she had been forgetful.
Amato noticed the sudden shudder that ran over Miss Lorimer, her
pained eyes as she raised them to her mother, and in an instant he
too discovered the truth. It was an unwelcome discovery, and it may
have caused him some anxiety, but he was full of pity, and, with a
gay air, the melody of his voice penetrating her ears, and with his
eyes turned upon her with admiration, Helen heard him say:
“No, our little ball of rocks and stones and trees with its little
population will keep its own course,
_Far into silent regions blue and pale_
and we shall all become very happy in each other’s
company, and finally by some pleasant accident land lightly on some
lovely sphere, inhabited by wondrous creatures who will give us their
services and show us the beauties of their planet, and make us forget
the cruel world, by their fairness and goodness and powers. Would you
like that Miss Lorimer?”
The image did please Helen, as if, in some such way, she might enter
Heaven, and she smiled, but the next moment she looked grave again,
and said:
“No—there can be no escape—just now; no running away from our duties.
There is so much to be done! Can you think Amato, of any greater
recreancy than leaving the Museum?”
“Or our incomes,” muttered Mr. Lorimer.
Julieta felt that she had been inadvertent; it pained her deeply, and
she turned their attention to the streaming sunlight: “Show Mr. Amato
the Smugglers’ Notch Helen. The day is really beautiful. We might
arrange for a luncheon near the Lips where those caves are, while you
explore the Chin. The views to-day will be glorious! The Lake and the
Adirondacks will be superb!”
“Yes, let us do that. All day in the air, and the splendid
pictures—!” exclaimed Helen.
So it was fixed that Helen and Amato should go on ahead to the Chin,
while Julieta and Mr. Lorimer would follow more leisurely and prepare
with the Host’s assistance a luncheon at the elevations called the
Lips, just above two natural caverns that pierced the mountain side
lower down. In a few moments Helen and Amato had started on their
way over the stony foot-path, broken by rough projections of rock,
and showing everywhere small patches of white pebbles dislodged or
broken from the thickly crowded veins of quartz, which seamed the
micaceous schist. The companions could not restrain their delight,
as on the right hand and on the left, their eyes traced the lowlands
to the distant mountains, the purpling Adirondacks in the west, the
hazy White Mountains in the far east, with the Hogback range just
beyond the vale of Stowe. And Lake Champlain!—how incomparable it
appeared, rifted with islands. The light flooding this vast domain
was broken by shifting shadows of clouds, and the effects of the
sheer deep escarpments of rock were bold and strong. The abruptness
of the verticality on either side of their tortuous path brought the
eyes of the climbers quickly to the lowlands, giving a delightful
visual sensation as if suspended above the caparisoned farmlands, the
woods, the sinuous waters; and ever and anon lifting their gaze to
the Adirondacks they saw the serrated peaks disappearing in a golden
rush of sun-haze.
Amato was busy in his mind with the suggestion of the breakfast
table, and he wondered as he helped the beautiful woman at his side
over the rougher passage of the path, whether it was wise of him to
think of speaking his heart to her. He felt the intangible obstacle,
and his confidence sank a little as he recalled the mental strength
of his rival—a sort of quality that would appeal well to Miss
Lorimer. But then many things had encouraged him, and the apparent
absence of the Mayor hinted at some disagreement which had come
about before he entered the scene, and which had perhaps severed all
intercourse between the Mayor and Helen Lorimer. That some rankling
hurt remained behind was natural, but his own devotion might justly
now, as at an appointed time, rise to allay that pain.
Miss Lorimer was debonair and happy, her spirits rose with the
broadening and divine day. She accepted Amato’s assistance with
laughing reproaches at his humiliating doubts over her own strength.
These had been especially offered, and thankfully used, when, for an
instant, they diverted their way down the rocks at the Lips to look
into the crevice that was called a cave, and Amato felt his own heart
beat faster as he pressed her hands or his face, by the accidents
of the scramble, came near her own. They hurried on over the lichen
crusted stones, slipping gaily, and feeling the intoxication of the
alpine air.
It was bliss to Amato, it certainly was pleasure to Helen Lorimer.
They had reached the extreme end of the Chin, and gazed down a
precipitous descent to a lower level, where rested a small lake,
while beyond rose again another eminence—the Adam’s Apple of this
titanic visage. Below them a forest covered amphitheatrical bowl
denoted the Smugglers’ Notch, where trees covered the whole lower
land, in unbroken expanses—spruce, birch, beech, and oak—and now
were tossing their arms in leafy confusion as some nether current of
air rushed through them. It almost seemed as if they raised their
multitudinous arms in salutation to the high perched humans who
wonderingly watched their violent agitation.
When a cloud swept across the sun, and the pinnacled cumuli were
beginning to float upward from the horizons, then the sylvan solitude
beneath them became dark, and with its foreground of the chased
mountain side, and the rough uninhabited rocks, put on an ominous
and romantic air. It suggested night prowling expeditions, and
hidden dens of the old smugglers. Amato asked about them, and why
the name was used for the place. And Helen told him about the early
days of the Embargo under Jefferson, when commerce with foreign
countries—France and England—was prohibited, in retaliation for the
depredations made by both countries upon American ships; and then how
business languished, and the desperate citizens crossed the borders
along the Canada line, fetching there their products, and how they
used the Great Lakes and the long waterway and the wooded shores of
Lake Champlain, with its many islands for retreat and harborage.
It was a new and pleasant story for her listener, to whom the woods,
they then looked down upon, became silvered in the moonlight, and
threaded by dark figures of the border smugglers in their nocturnal
trades.
Helen told him that the products of the Champlain region were lumber,
pork, brandy, and potash. These found a ready market at Albany and
the thriving towns of Fort Edward and Whitehall. But when the Embargo
came, the merchants turned to Canada; out of the lumber they made
rafts, on the rafts they crowded their liquor, potash, and pork,
hoisted the sails, and with the drifting wind floated down over the
whole lake, across the line to Canada. Windmill Bay was a favorite
place of shipment; sometimes twenty-five rafts went out, taking
advantage of the darkness and the south wind. Wagons traversed the
old roads to Canada, and these were sometimes closed by the militia;
the rafts were stopped or seized, but the trade kept on. A revenue
cutter came up the Onion river, southward toward Burlington, and
fired on the smugglers but in the encounters the militia were usually
unsuccessful. If a raft was captured, the captors were almost sure
to be surprised and the raft cut out a few nights later. One night
forty men, armed and painted as Indians, surrounded some troops near
the boundary, and frightened them into a profound sleep, while a raft
with thirty sails and measuring ten acres in surface, floated slowly
by into Canadian waters.
“In this notch below us,” said Helen, “the traders hid their stores,
and gathered in the nights to begin their smuggling march to Canada,
with wheels tied up in rags, and muskets on their shoulders, or else
they slipped away from here to the Champlain shores to embark upon
the tardy rafts.”
The thought of this early time, with its wildness and aboriginal
tinct, pleased Amato. He mused a little over it, and then, almost
unbidden by any preparatory thought, he uttered the deep motive that
ruled him.
“Perhaps Miss Lorimer,” he began “I can choose no better place than
this to tell you”—Helen Lorimer was looking at him with a startled
half puzzled stare—“that I love you from the bottom of my heart. I
loved you the first day I ever saw you. I need not conceal it, for I
am not going to be a nuisance. Let me be your friend at least—but—I
shall not long be content with that alone—it would be impossible if
my case is hopeless—I will fight my battle somewhere else. Does this
grieve you?”
Helen was looking strangely away from him and something drawn and sad
filled her face; the eyes were downcast, and she had pressed back her
hair from her cheeks, whither it had blown, and in this disarray with
a steamer cap in her other hand she became to Amato more bewitching
and irresistible. He could not stop.
“Oh please Miss Lorimer, let me stay—let me hope. Such speeches as
this you have heard before, but perhaps they have not been conjoined
with so much patience—for I will wait, and wait—wait to prove to you
how uttermost is my love—wait till you know yourself that my love can
be unselfish, strange as that sounds. Think well of me and keep me
here.”
“Ah—I do think well of you Rudolph”—Amato leaned towards her, he felt
like falling at her feet; most grotesquely he thought that if she had
asked him to jump down the ragged splintered cliff at their side he
would have, then and there, done it, _for her sake_. His name from
her lips sounded like music; he would prize that name henceforth,
because SHE had spoken it.
“—but” she was speaking, “you must not speak of this again—not
now—not till I say you may. I will try you. I have had my—pains:” she
caught her flushed cheeks in her two hands, as if she would crush
back to its hiding the tell-tale blood, “—but you are indeed my
friend—you can help me. Yes, Rudolph,” again that sweet familiarity
that seemed to close round the young man like a sensible embrace, “I
do think well of you—”
And then a queer thing happened. It was one of those sympathetic
responses in Nature that appear almost as if an intelligent
compositor—or better a composer—set upon the physical face of things
the seal of a spiritual and poetic beauty. A twittering cloud of
birds surrounded them; they were the chaste little black-poll
warblers, beating up from the forest, and, with an impulse of
friendliness fearlessly settling on the angular rocks, so that they
spread a confused surface of movement about them, and then—even as
the two friends forgot their surprise—they rose without sound into
the sky like a puff of smoke and went southward.
“The winter comes,” said Helen; she rose and began the slight descent
from the cairn-like pinnacle whose escarpment on the north ended in
the little tarn. In an instant Amato was at her side, helping her,
and when he released her hand upon the flat path homewards he raised
it and kissed it, and it was not withdrawn.
The lunch at the Lips was a great success. Amato was in ecstasies.
Mr. Lorimer and his sister observed that Helen had brightened, and
Helen herself launched out into brave railleries over the foolish
exuberance of the feast. It was a handsome and incongruous array.
A table cloth pulled over a flat rock made the table, and here
garnished with pickles and olives, curries and salted nuts, was
spread delicate cuts of cold beef and chicken, with interspersed
salads, and potted lobster, with fresh rolls and crisp biscuit, iced
tea and lemonade, and then, as a climax of the culinary bravado, the
waiters disappeared into the rocks and emerged with an ice-cream
freezer and a basket of champagne.
“Oh!” exclaimed Helen, “this is outrageous, monstrous, Uncle! It is
pure desecration. Convention against nature! The Oreads will become
our besetting Furies. Dew, roots, herbs, and wild honey should form
our repast—and all this omnivorous hunger at the very mouth of the
sleeping Giant!”
“Let us hope,” said Mr. Lorimer, “that the dear fellow will not wake.
He might prefer us to this gastronomic medley. As for honey, here
Helen, is some of the best—straight from Condits—and I think the dew,
roots, and herbs can be dispensed with; you will certainly forget all
about them when you have tasted this dry Mouquin.”
“And I,” spoke up Amato with mock gravity, “will take care of the
Oreads; if they venture to disturb us I will exorcise them with a
fine latin anathema that the Fathers recommended for Devils.”
It was a festival moment, and the savagery of the isolated ridge
blended with the comic contradiction of a Fifth Avenue banquet amused
and entertained them all. To Amato it was quite clear that good
food—the best—acquired a new charm when the farthest removed from its
origins. But their hopes for a continuance of the bright day were
doomed to disappointment; the sky became filmed with clouds, that
darkened into rain, and beating a retreat the merry company followed
by the little retinue of caterers, scampered back to the refuge at
the hotel.
Amato did wonders in entertainment. There was an old piano hammered
out of all semblance to a musical instrument by the ambitious banging
of innumerable strollers, lady performers and sledge fingered
bucolics, “who played by ear,” in the parlor of the hotel; and from
this Amato extorted enough becoming sound for the accompaniment
of his really excellent singing. So the day passed. To Amato it
had been one of victory, and when the night shut them in, and
after a few games, all had retired, Amato alone sprang out upon
the porch and walked up and down in the intervals of the showers,
smoking, and thinking, and planning. Life had never seemed so
desirable, so promising, and after midnight a stray fox, engaged in
a reconnaissance of the chicken fold, stopped a moment outside in
the wet boulders, to notice the perambulating spark that ceaselessly
moved to and fro against the dripping-clapboards of the Summit
House. To Amato his mission of love had become deepened with a new
meaning; he cherished it more than ever, since he knew it might mean
a _Mission of Mercy_ too.
CHAPTER XII
THE TRIAL
November had come and the day for the great Trial had come with it.
Events had been moving rapidly, and political and social forces
concurred to gather the citizens of the City-State into two opposing
parties. Within one of them resided the aristocratic principles
taught by Helen Lorimer, and within the other—though far more
obscurely—the disorganizing tendencies of The Beehive. Between these
formidable elements of political disturbance and political prestige
the Mayor directed his course with consummate skill. The man’s
enormous power of concentration, his impetuous activity, became
the marvel of the commonwealth. This ambitious scholar and orator,
touched with a utopian idealism, which Briggs had thought betokened
at the outset simply weakness, and mental inertia—a view which the
Mayor’s conduct at first quite appropriately justified—had amazed the
politicians, with his swift recoil from all their shifty opportunism.
He had introduced important reforms, he had established new standards
of proficiency in the city’s business, he had deliberately approached
his constituents of all shades of opinion, and he had not hesitated
to declare himself the exponent of a vast utilitarianism, which aimed
at the perfect government of the City, and the realization within
its borders of universal happiness. He had been referred to by some
wag as the City’s Augustus, who was engaged in the Sisyphean task
of reconciling irreconcilable elements, and building a permanent
commonwealth upon the treacherous sands of caprice, selfishness,
pride, extravagance, and envy.
They said the Mayor was trying to maintain the traditional State—a
well ordered union of all forces, conditions, and occupations—whereas
the State oscillated between two opposite inclinations, one making
for an oligarchical rule of wealth, and family, the other for a
proletariat of a levelling demagoguery. They pointed to the fact
that the Mayor encouraged the ceremonials of the Holidays, that he
officiated at the laying of corner stones, he affected a public
ostentation; his frequent allocutions to the people were in the
nature of lectures, and his endorsement of all plans of public
improvement, his familiar frequentation of the poorer section of
the City, his undisguised appeal to the rich for support, all these
things pointed to his realization of a conflict which only his
multifarious sympathies for the present concealed. And they were
right.
The Mayor was the visible bond of a provisional peace. His method, as
these ingenious and learned critics pointed out, was the Augustinian
_pax Romana_, by which he attempted as far as possible to reconcile
divergent interests, and, in a process of universal stimulation,
ministering to the municipal pride, to hide the increasing
mobilization of the forces of conservatism and radicalism in opposite
camps. But these forces daily grew more compact, and busily engaged
their respective resources—in papers, magazine writers, public
speakers—to illustrate and defend their theories. It was felt by
the more thoughtful that society stood upon the verge of conflict,
which might mean several things. Two prominently emerged. A civil
state on the one hand constituted upon a stricter enforcement of the
individual rights of property, and on the other some yet indefinable
new social organism which subjected individual rights to legislative
revision, and in all probability to legislative annulment. The
situation had become interesting, and below the mere academic surface
of affairs burned the fires of a temperamental hostility, that would
not be content with a peaceful solution.
The Mayor—smarting with an inner pain he confessed to no one,
as indeed he had no one to confess it to—became involved in a
propaganda of mutual toleration, and worked upon an Aristotelian
basis of a state utilizing all tendencies in the preservation of a
fabric of checks and balances, with mutual toleration. The sting
of his unmerited repulse by Mr. Lorimer, might have easily led him
into reprisals and retaliation. It might naturally have turned his
thoughts towards the creation of conditions bearing more heavily
upon the rich—the Carrara group of proud conservatives but it did
nothing of the sort. The man preserved a perfect mental serenity,
and weighed with even more scrupulous care the exact proportions of
his sympathies with either faction, hoping to develop a third and
balancing power, which would control the electorate.
His public acts were marked with a fine regard for justice, his
innovations in the financial government of the city were well
considered, and his appointments critically excellent. Not a trace
of selfishness could be detected in his work, not the slightest
yielding to corrupt influences, not the most tenuous showing of
political craft. And this in no wise jeopardized his reputation among
the very classes who suffered rebuff at his hands. For it was too
well understood, as Mr. Briggs told Tom Ratler, that the Mayor was a
compromise candidate at the last election, and had himself emphasized
the independent attitude he was entitled to bear towards all parties.
All this had won him praise from the moderates and sensible, but it
had also brought him into a less enviable estimate with the rancorous
and radical of both sides.
Had he been a weak man, intellectually, this even course might
have assumed the expression of timidity, or simply a puritanical
notionalism that, by some kind of exact partition of its smiles to
either quarter, hoped to conciliate all. Not so with the Mayor. His
strength was unmistakable, and his language tremendously forcible
and correct. No one knew that his ingenious and convincing language,
his incessant anxiety and explanatory emphasis, the vigorous novelty
of his addresses and Bulletins, had their source of power in the
smarting and bruised heart of the man, for, as will occur with such
temperaments, where a pride of despotic power, and at the same
time a pride of jealous apprehension, the pride of an unusual mind
associated with a personal history of struggle and self-denial, has
been deeply wounded, the energies of the mind storm some new citadel
of difficulty, and minister distraction. Such consolation is indeed
temporary, but it suffices to allay the worst aches, and if the
effort brings praise and distinction, smothers the fires of fever and
desire.
In an article of much length which had appeared in the numbers of
one of the best magazines, the Mayor had anonymously discussed the
situation. The article attracted attention, and was made the text of
editorials and sermons, of conversation and drawing room talk, and
every one knew that its author was the Mayor. In it the Mayor had
aired his studies of Roman History—a favorite topic with him—relying
as he did upon such pictures of the first days of the Empire as
Ferrero has given us. In a pregnant paragraph he depicted the whole
dilemma.
“The predicament of the ancient Roman State at the time of Augustus,
if we accept the delineation of Ferrero, was the supineness of the
governing classes, their reluctance to exercise the functions of
Rule, their intolerable surrender to indulgence, to the depravity
of a sensual and oriental luxuriance, and the dilettantism of
literary tastes. With Rome at that time engaged in a hopeless task
to revive an ancient decorum, and the stolidity of an antique moral
forcefulness, the problem of Augustus seems to have been how to
distribute the burdens of government, and save himself from the
arduous responsibility of “running the machine” alone.
“At the top was a nobility dissipated, selfish, and forgetful,
which had lost the manhood of its former state, and now revelled in
glorious depravities which an eastern civilization had introduced,
and made irresistible; next to it was a knighthood class interested
in attaining wealth, in successful business enterprises, in the
exploitation of the resources of the vast empire, and also too
willing to surrender the burden of government to any one—and Augustus
had grown in their eyes semi-divine—who would conduct it, so as
to least disturb their enterprises of thrift and emolument. Below
them came the masses of retainers, freemen, slaves, veterans, small
merchants, and artificers, professional loafers, and impecunious
litigants, who looked to the government and the richer guilds for
entertainment and support, for gladiatorial shows and bread.
“Our present condition is rather one of Social War, because all wish
to govern, and the political prowess of individuals was never more
imposing. There is here no disintegration of Ambition. Our danger is
not one from surrendered rights, but rather from the clamorous claim
for more rights, from the importunity of too many doctors.
“Society sensibly oscillates between two possible extremes, and the
old adage that government is Compromise, forms, with this City-State,
the _ideal programme_, under the control of sense, toleration, and
accommodation. Our vitality is enormous. Our talent unlimited, our
wealth boundless, the freshness and vigor of enterprise unimpaired,
our mental activity exaggeratedly quick and responsive. There is no
general lethargy here, though we enlist every element of pleasure.
The elective franchise was never more greedily enjoyed, never more
desperately believed in and used. We have become _doctrinaire_, but
the philosopher carries his shillalah and his gun. Theories have
become creeds, and there are martyrs to die for them. THE STATE
MIGHT BECOME DISRUPTED THROUGH WAR, IT WILL NEVER DISAPPEAR THROUGH
INANITION.”
The crystallizing process continued, and the two parties confronted
each other, the Conservatives—called The Plum-Puddings—and the
Radicals—called The Levellers—and the event of some determined
strikes had more sharply defined them. Force had been vigorously used
to suppress the disorders, that had arisen in their wake and The
Beehive, anxious to breed a deeper feeling of distrust, willing to
start into action the most wicked and dangerous characters upon some
crusade of retaliation and violence, had seized the chance to sow the
seed of discontent and Revolution.
The Mayor had been thoroughly straightforward and insistent He had
made it clear that street disorder must cease, he had denounced The
Beehive, and threatened it with suppression; he had summoned a mass
meeting of the temperate people and in a great speech had reiterated
his control over the best elements, and effected a complete
suspension of criticism. The Mayor loomed larger. His hand worked
with masterly precision, and he was found at every point able and
alert. The bigots—and Mr. Lorimer was one of them—remained silent in
company, when his praises were sounded, through behind closed doors,
and in each others’ company, they denounced him. The radicals feared
him, and Longtinsky and his gang cursed him.
Mr. Briggs and Tom Ratler longed for the exile and forcible expulsion
of Longtinsky. They kept up a close watch over The Beehive, and
Briggs, in private, gave Tom long winded bodings of disaster, if
the sheet was not soon stifled. He indulged—so far as the Mayor
would let him—in ornamented appeals, but the Mayor discerned the
mistake of interference just at the moment, and The Beehive continued
its polluting course, though hidden from public view. The Mayor
was right. The Beehive frenzied a few, and made them murderers at
heart—as it turned out murderers in fact—but it had not extended
influence, and its vicious constituency only seemed formidable,
because it was hypothetically involved with a much less violent
Socialism.
The trial of the incendiaries, or the suspects, in some way focused
the attention of all parties and factions. What with the applause
of the Socialists over the re-trial, and the promised liberation of
innocent men, the cries of protest put up by such extremists as Mr.
Livingston, the intervention of the Mayor, and the known interest of
Miss Lorimer in the matter, the trial attained a magnified importance.
It acted as a call for truce, and all agreed to watch its
developments before they organized for a further campaign of assault
and abuse. It became a strategic point, and might have been construed
as a pivotal opportunity for one or the other side to score a
victory. In reality it had no important relation to the political
embarrassment. And this the Mayor knew. But it was distinctly
distracting. It was an exhibition of magnanimity on the part of a
representative aristocratic family—the Lorimers—and it was at the
same time denounced by many of the Plum-Pudding complexion as a
ridiculous tampering with the proper course of the Law, and a sop to
discontent.
As a matter of fact its influence was favorable to the Plum-Puddings,
and Miss Lorimer became a popular illustration of goodness. It
disconcerted Longtinsky and Poniatowsky, and made them rave with
hate. It gave Longtinsky some anxiety for the preservation of
his own neck, and as his designs upon Helen Lorimer had suffered
discomfiture, he was beside himself with fear lest the unjustly
condemned men—professedly his confederates—would, in the case of
their liberation, turn upon him and rend him.
He consulted much with Poniatowsky who had become involved more
closely with him, and voluntarily—for Jessie’s sake—embarked in his
perilous ventures. Longtinsky had foreseen Poni’s capitulation, and
he used him unscrupulously, as a tool, which he fully intended to
reject and destroy at the right moment.
Longtinsky was terribly deceived as to the strength of his
sympathizers, but in his delusion he concocted the outrageous and
impossible scheme of a Massacre of the Rich. He planned it for the
day or week after the completion of the trial. Then two things
might happen. If it succeeded he would rush forward and forcibly
establish a government, or somehow, in the tumult, secure a place
in the new order of things; if it did not succeed he would flee,
and—if Poniatowsky followed him—he would KILL him. So too in the
subterranean camp of The Beehive and in the contorted depths of
Longtinsky’s brain the trial became a datum point and a cause of
action.
Helen Lorimer had interested Amato in the trial, and in the small
child, Shimura, who was to upset the state’s contention. During the
summer Shimura had been kept at the secluded and beautiful home of
Mr. Moser in Maine, on the shores of Penobscot Bay. Here the deformed
and strange waif, with his precocious sympathies, and his eager mind
grew stronger, and his meagre and weird inconsistent body assumed a
better aspect. Amato loved to talk with this boy and seemed to enjoy
the curious psychological problem he presented. It was a most genuine
interest and it affected Helen deeply; she recognized it and felt
grateful for it.
The trial court was in the New Court and Government Building upon
Centre and Chatham Street, in a room of princely proportions,
and handsomely decorated, after the style then prevalent of
mural embellishments. The selection of the jury had been a long
and wearisome process, for it was difficult to find twelve men
sufficiently free of prepossessions to serve the purposes of the
trial.
At last that preliminary was completed, and the trial began. Helen
Lorimer had at first hesitated to attend the sessions of the court,
for she believed that the Mayor might be also an occasional or even
frequent visitor to the trial, and, as no word had passed between
them since his letter of rejection, she dreaded to again meet him.
She had indeed not been unobservant of his actions and words, and she
secretly admired them, but his continued silence had angered her,
and slowly—very slowly—she effaced the dear impression he had made,
turning more and more willingly to the handsome creature at her side,
who attached himself to her daily life by innumerable attentions,
with a modest unwearying devotion, where too she saw the visible
notes of passion.
Her apprehensions were suddenly removed by a public announcement in
the public prints that the Mayor during the weeks or days of the
trial would take a vacation in the far West, where, it was also
reported he would be engaged in preparing his annual message to the
Legislature—a report currently believed to be a personal vindication
of his views as to the value of a purely material and utilitarian
interpretation of government—an anonymous writer in one of the
dailies had said that the Mayor believed in _Euthanasia_ for all
incurables, and death for the hopelessly insane.
This retirement of the Mayor permitted Helen to attend the trial, and
with her went Amato. The scene presented by the court was picturesque
in the extreme and the movement of the trial dramatic. A marble
canopy covered the chair of the presiding judge, a marble platform
supported the desk of dark wood before him, on either side along the
walls extended paintings of the course of Justice, from the delivery
of the Ten Commandments, to the ratification of the Constitution of
the United States, meeting at length, as they encompassed the sides
of the great room, in a symbolic _alto relievo_ statue of Justice
herself, holding her balanced scales, with bandaged eyes, and her
symmetrical sword directly opposite to the seat of the Judge, who
thus might be constantly reminded of his duty and his power.
A fence of bronze enclosed the customary area in front of the
judge, for the actors in the judicial play, filled with tables and
chairs, and a raised marble and cushioned seat to the right formed
the unusual rostrum for the witnesses. Behind all these details of
necessary formal construction the court room held an amphitheatrical
arrangement of perfectly white chairs, upon which the spectators
were permitted to arrange themselves in still further contributory
scenic groups. The color effect as might be imagined, was at least
extraordinary; the illuminated walls, the white throne of the judge,
the black wood of the desks and tables before him and the clustered
white seats of the auditorium, with the carelessly composed but
effective groups of the lawyers and clerks, and the crowded audience,
in which mingled upon terms, at least, of physical contact, the
elements and representatives of the divided political cohorts, a
heterogeneous assemblage of faces and costumes, instilled throughout
with expectancy and excitement. Among them all were not a few of the
very poor, friends of the prisoners, and not a few dark and scowling
faces, emissaries of The Beehive. Longtinsky was never seen at the
trial, though Poniatowsky was.
One of the opening dramatic moments was the entering of the
prisoners, the six men previously condemned to death; Dalzell, Vinta,
Bingo, Fabrizio, Polinck, Rinker. Dalzell was an Englishman, Vinta,
Fabrizio, and Polinck Italians, Bingo and Rinker born in America of
Swedish parents. The six men filed in under a heavy guard, and took
their seats within a railing to the left of the court room. Every
face in the crushed space looked at them, and this stare they met
in very different ways. Dalzell, Rinker, and Bingo smiled feebly,
but appeared unconcerned; the Italians were less assured, and shrank
together almost as if they resented the effrontery of this exposure.
The moment passed, the names of the prisoners were called, and
responded to, and the gavel of the judge fell as the prosecution
promptly rose to open the case.
Among those who had secured the privilege to a seat within the
rail were Mr. Briggs and Tom Ratler, the former as a _quasi_
representative of the Mayor, and the latter as his companion. The
eyes of these two searched the prisoners eagerly for Polinck.
Although to Mr. Briggs the re-trial was nonsense, yet at least he
felt that Polinck was the arch conspirator, next to Longtinsky,
and the ring leader of the men captured. Polinck was perhaps the
largest and strongest of all the prisoners. For an Italian he was
of unusual height and stoutly composed. His dark face punctured
by two flashing eyes and further intensified in its unpromising
expression of villainy by a heavy and curled black moustache would
have readily attracted attention, and almost the most indifferent
scrutiny would have recoiled from its hard favored and sinister
glance. Singularly for an Italian the hair was not profuse or
abundant, and actually carried a few white threads among its black
excess of rather thin locks, which, seen from the back, confessed
an incipient baldness. This scantiness of hair gave the dreaded
Polinck a curiously incongruous mien, which might have at first
provoked amusement, had not any such inclination been quickly
suppressed when he raised his malignant eyes. Tom Ratler studied his
face with interest, and besides Tom in the back of the court room
another student of physiognomy was engaged in the same duty. It was
Poniatowsky. He regarded Polinck as a rival for the favor of Jessie,
and indeed Polinck—in better days for both of them—had told him he
intended to marry Jessie. It was not altogether to Poni’s liking
that the huge Italian should return to the pursuit of his courtship,
though Poni grimly smiled at the unlikelihood of his meeting with
much encouragement, smiled even more grimly at the likelihood of his
leaving this world altogether.
Even more interesting to Mr. Briggs than the prisoners were the
members of the Jury.
On account of the political antagonism among men in the great city,
and the assumed importance of the trial in strengthening their
affiliations with one or the other parties, as there should be an
acquittal or another conviction, the counsel for the prosecution
and for the defense had strained every effort to exclude from the
jury those who sympathized with the conservatives, as well as those
who confessed their radical prejudices. The result had been only to
fill the box with twelve men, who professed complete impartiality,
and a satisfactory confidence to judge the evidence uninfluenced
by any political sympathies. Mr. Briggs studied their faces with
anxious scrutiny, and secured for his pains a general impression
of intelligence, unrelieved by any distinction, and absolutely
free of personal idiosyncrasies, which was a point in their favor.
Helen Lorimer on the front row of the white chairs, reserved for
the auditors, was no less interested, and her examination produced
a similar impression of safety, though her wishes in regard to the
trial were the reverse of those of the irreconcilable secretary.
Miss Lorimer and her companion attracted much attention, and their
good looks won for them approving comments. A good many women and
not a few men rejoiced to see the famous patroness of the poor, and
of some of the culprits now being tried, and the no less famous
propagandist of the philosophy of caste. It was naturally assumed
that the handsome man who accompanied her was to be her future
husband, though on that score the suspicions were rather whispered
than spoken aloud. The excitement of the occasion and her own deep
confession of solicitude gave to Miss Lorimer great animation, and
added not a little to her radiance and beauty.
Indeed the lawyers for the prosecution would have willingly excluded
her, for they felt her influence prejudicial to their case. They knew
that it was largely through her efforts that the new testimony had
been procured, and they acknowledged the power she exerted throughout
the community by her unquestioned talent, goodness, and activity.
They dreaded the effect upon the admiring and forgetful jurors. They
had struggled with some legal subterfuges to secure her expulsion,
but it was a forlorn attempt, and doomed to failure. The trial began,
and Miss Lorimer remained an observant listener. And Amato was no
less interested. The trial was a novelty for both, and its details
with their dramatic touches, the skilled conflict of the lawyers, the
dignity and impassiveness of the judge, and the manifold coloring of
humanity in it all, even its dull processes and wearisome tracts of
routine, attracted them. From first to last they remained absorbed
auditors and listeners.
Mr. Meldexter, the District attorney for New York County, made the
opening address to the Jury. He depicted in words of courteous rebuke
the fresh attempt to release the condemned after a fair trial by
their equals, and then, warming up to the subject, with withering
scorn foretold its failure, affirming, in an eloquent conclusion,
that the course of Justice could not be swerved by any subterfuges
of interest, or any inventions of pity. His address gave Mr. Briggs
the keenest satisfaction, and his nudges of Tom Ratler punctuated the
telling points of the oration. Miss Lorimer heard it with incredulity
and admiration. She knew Mr. Meldexter was quite unprepared for the
sort of evidence Mr. Moser would offer, and his soaring tirade gave
her no alarm.
The evidence against the accused followed. It consisted for the most
part, as far as it was vital, of the testimony of the police, with
some additional proofs of the criminal character of the prisoners.
The principal point made, was the arrest of the prisoners among a
crowd of others, who escaped, rushing from the burning building
at the very moment when the explosions occurred which destroyed
life, and wrecked the Settlement House, that quickly caught fire
and disappeared in smoke and flames. This was followed by various
identifications of the prisoners by witnesses, who offered their
opinions and experiences with them (the prisoners) as raising a
presumption that they (the prisoners) were undesirable citizens. The
examination of one of these, unexpectedly furnished amusement to the
court room, and threw even a shade of diversion over the sombre faces
of the accused men.
The witness was an old woman who carried on her physiognomy the most
complicated record of time’s effects, in a wilderness of wrinkles,
and who kept one—it was apparently all she possessed—elongated
incisor always in view, overlapping her lower lip, like the fang of a
dog constantly on guard. She spoke in a voice which if not seriously
damaged by time in its loudness, had been entirely robbed of any
of its former sweetness. Her little eyes retired into dull browned
and stained sockets, and from those hiding places kept a weirdly
incessant stare at the examiner, twitching now and then convulsively,
or closing completely as if they sought a moment’s respite from so
much publicity. Her skinny and pallid fingers were clasped together
over the top of an umbrella, whose distended sides and numerous
patches betokened a contemporaneous age with its owner.
When asked her name and age she confessed to the appellation of
_Emily Pint_, and with reference to her age snapped out that; “it
didn’t consarn ennyone, and enny how was something she knowed nuthin’
about.”
The examiner then directed her to raise her eyes and inspect the
prisoners, and tell such things as she veraciously might affirm of
their antecedents, and reputation.
The old woman turned round slowly and fixed her unwinking eyes upon
the men. She remained this way silent and observing for a few minutes
much to the astonishment of the lawyer who exhibited some annoyance,
not unaccompanied with perplexity and who finally allowed his
impatience to frame the indiscreet question, “whether she was ready
to answer?”
“Why—yees—I am, purviding you don’t ask me too much.” “Madame I
intend to ask you all that is required for the proper instruction of
the Jury,” retorted the lawyer with dignity.
“Well—well—don’t git peevish. I’ll tell ye whativer I know but I
suppose you don’t want me to tell you what I don’t know.”
An audible titter met this sally, and was rebuked by the court, who
warned the witness that frivolity would be sternly punished; an
allocution which brought the lean visage of the old woman sharply
round in the direction of the judge and put on it an expression of
such whimsical perturbation, that the previous titter threatened to
become outright laughter.
“Tell the Jury if you know the prisoners or any one of them.”
“I know ’em all, and a bad bunch too Mister,” almost shouted the
witness, whose excitement carried her along in a torrent of abuse;
“They come one night inter my store and slammed round outrageous;
they pit me inter an empty barrel, and tied me ’ands and ’elped
’emselves to tobbaccy and pipes and amost enny thing they could
lay their ’ands on; they is a good-fer nuthin’ loafin’, thievin’,
snickerin’ lot of bums—and thet’s the gospel truth.”
“And they left no recompense to you for their abstractions?” asked
the cross examiner.
“I’m a leetle deef” squealed the old woman with a disengaged hand
to her ear. “Bit ef you mean by _tractions_ the stuff they took off
why—No—they jist robbed pure and simple, and I niver got out ef thet
barrel till the nex day—the dirty trash dey are—and me a respectable
ooman as must earn her way in the warld—Ah, Ha!” in her excitement
she had risen from the marble witness bench, and was shaking her
umbrella above her head at the amazed prisoners, while the amusement
in the audience developed dangerously, and the judge was rapping for
quiet, and the assistant sheriffs were hurrying in the direction of
the irate female, who still shouted; “Ah-Ha! I’s got yees now mee
honey-birds, and old Emily Pint will mek yees holler as ye did me,
ye black skinned unrighteous varmints. Wen ye pit me in the barrel
ye askt me ef I could preach a sarmon. Weel—I just guess ye don’t
care for this sart of a sarmon—do ye—me jolly chucks. Is it more ye
want me to say?—” and the frenzied woman, quite beside herself with
the malice of revenge turned to the astounded judge, flourishing
her umbrella in the air, while the energy of her action tumbled the
ancient head-gear which shielded her frowzy locks down her back,
and left her gasping with her minute eyes shining with the baleful
flicker of a crazy joy.
Order was restored, and the exhausted witness sank back in the seat;
the judge sternly inquired if the witness was necessary, and, being
assured that the prosecution regretted the episode, turned to Mr.
Moser, and requested him to cross-examine if he thought it expedient.
Mr. Moser rose and approached the still panting woman and quietly—as
if from some casual curiosity—asked her if she could say how many men
were in the party that perpetrated this outrage.
“How many?” queried Emily Pint, “dere was tree of dem, one as stopped
the door, another held me in de barrel—de slab-faced scab—and the
ither swiped mee trade—” her excitement returned, and Mr. Moser
waved to the clerks who led her away, while he audibly remarked that
there happened to be six prisoners—a fact already impressed on the
audience, who in various states of fluttering comment, had again
leaned back in their chairs, and waited, with renewed animation, for
the further progress of the case.
The prosecution without calling Longtinsky, had at the instigation
of Mr. Briggs, undertaken to show the acquaintance of the prisoners
with _him_, and the influence upon them of his paper, The Beehive.
This was done by a number of witnesses, whose testimony was not even
questioned by the defence. At last the prosecution rested, and Mr.
Moser addressing the court, opened the defence.
He admitted the heinous nature of the outrage committed, its
dangerous effects, the necessity for its summary punishment, but
he insisted that there could be but one opinion as to the further
necessity of punishing the real miscreants, and that Justice would
only fail in her mission if the innocent suffered, and the guilty
escaped; that Society could not afford to blindly look for victims
for her revenge—much as Emily Pint had done—without discriminating
between its real foes and superstitious culprits. He alluded to
the fact that the previous trial had been held under the immediate
influence of great excitement, when the startled city, blinded by
its apprehension of some menacing convulsion sought too quickly
the condemnation of any one that might satisfy its natural but
unreasonable thirst for retaliation. The defence, he said, engaged
itself to show that three of the prisoners were absolutely innocent,
two doubtfully concerned in the outrage, while it freed itself
absolutely from any contract to limit the amount of guilt properly to
be affixed to Lorenzo Albertino Marchesa Polinck.
This announcement was heard with very different sensations in
all parts of the court room, and it was received everywhere with
interest, and for the most part, among those not personally concerned
in the outcome of the trial, with approval. Popular sentiment had
already changed, and the new aspect put upon the case received
deliberate and rational attention throughout the city. It was not
acceptable to Mr. Briggs, it left Tom Ratler dubious. The sudden
concentration of guilt upon Polinck brought the strangest sort of
grin to the face of Poniatowsky, while to the excepted man himself
it summoned a tide of color that darkened his swarthy cheeks, and
spread in encircling rings about his bull-sinewed neck. Helen Lorimer
and Amato lost no word of the address, and to Miss Lorimer the hope
of saving the unfortunate men—deluded, deceived, duped, and misused,
grew stronger. Mr. Moser continued.
He said he would introduce a new name in the register of the accused,
the name of a man whom it would be necessary to subpoena to the
trial, one whom—after he had finished his work—he believed the
industrious and learned District Attorney would find it incumbent
upon him to place where he now saw the six prisoners at the bar, and
that man was Peter Tolstoy Longtinsky. There was a perceptible stir
in the audience. It began at a number of points, and it consisted
of a variety of movements. Some people suddenly looked up, others
shifted their positions, and whispered to their neighbors, some
glared and seemed uneasy, many smiled and shook their heads, with a
“I told you so,” expression, and two men got up and left the court
house. One of these was Mr. Briggs, the other was Poniatowsky. Mr.
Briggs went out to take precautions that Longtinsky should be placed
under surveillance at once, and that his chance of escaping from the
city should be prevented; Poniatowsky went out to tell Longtinsky of
the new threat and to make new plans.
Longtinsky had kept his eye and ear—so to speak—on the trial. Poni
had told him of every move, and many others too. He knew the danger
that filled the air for him, and yet he did not stir. Riveted by a
strange infatuation that his destiny was upon the eve of blossoming
into the powers of control that he dreamed of, and which seethed
through his dusky brain, and ran before him in beckoning panoramas
of riches and eminence, he refused to flee the city, though each day
was to make it more and more clear that his safety was elsewhere. And
now this deliberate assault by name; the certainty of his arrest,
and possible trial, if not as a principal as an instigator, a
conspirator, would almost surely follow.
No one suspected the new evidence, and it might be too damaging.
Longtinsky and Poni knew the real state of the case, and to Poni it
was a fixed fact that Longtinsky would be tried for the crime. He
knew his guilt, Longtinsky had confessed that. Poni held Longtinsky
in no great esteem, but they had become intertwined in a plot for
gain, for revenge. Poni would have liked to come into close quarters
with Tom Ratler, and Longtinsky thirsted for the death of Helen
Lorimer. Poni felt no too great confidence in Longtinsky’s loyalty,
but at the minute he felt his life was essential for his own plans.
So he hurried from the court room with the announcement of Mr.
Moser in his ears, just as Mr. Briggs made his way to the police
headquarters to direct the close watch of the editor of The Beehive
preliminary to his subpoena and arrest.
Mr. Moser had finished his speech, and deferred the offering of
his evidence, just as Poniatowsky entered the small room—editorial
chambers and bed-room—where the ponderous editor was buried deep
in the composition of a great leader. He burst impatiently into
the room; “Come put up your ink and pens—the long road for you.
Tinsky you’re a pinched man, Moser says _you did it_,” he cried.
Longtinsky raised his head and a terrified look covered his face, but
he overcame it, and twisting his chair around, he faced the excited
Italian, and told him to take a seat and tell all he knew.
Poni not only told all he knew, but he added much more he did
not know. He drew in the most alarming outlines the probable
course of events, stopping at nothing that might unsettle the—to
him—inexplicable inertia of the man before him. And yet in spite of
his horrible forebodings, in which with sundry realistic gestures
he tried to make the anarchist understand the unpleasant aspects of
hanging, Longtinsky remained unmoved. His face did show momentary
terror, but it vanished the instant he let his imagination dwell on
the magnificent insurrection his irresistible appeals would bring
about.
Suddenly he jumped to his feet, his ungainly figure making the effort
more surprising; his misshapen mouth shaped itself into a strange
smile, his little eyes glittered and his portentous ears seemed
almost to extend themselves, as he seized the astonished informer by
the shoulders, looked straight down upon him, and exclaimed;
“Poni, I will not leave. _Never._ Let them take me. It will be the
sign for the great revolt. Already three bands of the faithful are
ready to rise. One word and the new Era starts. Be ready. They can
prove nothing. I will add this to the appeal here,” and he slapped
his broad hand down upon the loose leaves of paper which bore his
weekly message of discontent and upbraidings and exhortation, “Let it
come, the Torch, the Dagger—but finally _Victory_.”
Poniatowsky stormed to his feet, maddened beyond endurance by this
folly; the obsession of the man stupified him at times, he had been
growing worse, Poni wondered if he was entirely sane;
“Damnation,” he cried, “Tinsky you’re a doomed fool. If you can’t see
the way out of this I can. I’ll not pull a rope tighter. Jessie and I
get out of this. Where’s the girl?”
Again the plotting mood returned to the editor, and his stalking
craft seized the opportunity to fasten the brigand before him to his
purpose and plots. A deep malevolence beguiled him; neither he nor
Poni nor Jessie nor any one should leave the city. The hate he bore
Helen Lorimer rose and stifled sense. At any rate, first her death,
and—then—perhaps—_perhaps_—Flight!
He motioned to Poni to take the chair he had thrown against the
wall in disgust. The man reluctantly obeyed. Longtinsky stood in
front of him, and his words were spoken in a lower tone, with more
hesitation and with brief pauses; “Poniatowsky,” it was seldom his
listener had been addressed with so much ceremony, and he resented
it, but remained silent, “I want you to take my place here—right
here with Jessie—see everything is fixing for the outbreak; we have
ammunition, dynamite, and the men are all drilled for the _uprising_.
Let them take me, let them imprison me, convict me,” his voice was
rising with a sort of wail that fairly disconcerted his hearer, “and
then I give the word—our plans are laid, and you lead an assault
on the courthouse—see—there will be Tom Ratler,” a curse passed
from the lips of Poni, “and there will be Briggs, and—there will
be—I know it—I know it—there will be Helen Lorimer. Remember your
promise—she is dead and Jessie is _all yours_—Yes all yours. Let
Bomber strike the houses at Carrara, and Putkof light the torches
at the river sides—and then our men will gather—_the men that lost
the strikes_—They have forgotten nothing—nothing—they will march on
the armories—on the City Hall—there are two thousand ready. I have
strong husky men and—I can arm them—I have two barges on the East
River full of guns—full—You start!—Yes, they are there: they look
like dirt scows, but their holds are full of guns. Madder is on one,
Felix on the other; they hate the Mayor; he threw them over after
the elections—Bomber has a cache of guns and powder at High Bridge
and Putkof enough kerosene to burn a navy. We have a friend in the
janitor of the armory at Thirty-fourth street. We can make that our
headquarters; we can sweep the city—the start made, the rest is easy.
You must stay—you must take my directions, keep things together
and—remember _Jessie is yours_—and—wealth, money, pleasure—power,”
he was speaking louder, faster, and Poni, dazed with the revelation
of the underground, unsuspected combinations, the immensity of the
plot, was dumb; “Here are the keys to this desk,” he handed Poni a
bunch of keys, “in there are directions—the whole plan—work it out
for me, Poni, for Jessie; I see their cursed scheme—arrest me and all
is nipped—Ah! ha! they think so—but Poni—give them the lie—the slip.
Come let me finish this,” pointing to the unfinished editorial “and
to-night, we will go over everything and get all ready, and then let
them take me—”
There was something almost maniacal in the man’s fever of
desperation, as he revealed things he had never whispered before.
In a moment he laid bare his big intrigues, and subterranean
conspiracies. Poni was dumfounded; for once his nerve deserted
him, he felt Longtinsky’s mental strength and silently he left the
room, after a promise to return in the night, when Longtinsky would
assemble also the _others_, and the plotters for the destruction of
the City would complete their plans. Everything had been leading to
this; the danger had been lowering; now with this new trial of the
convicted men, with whose execution his—Longtinsky’s—preparations
might have been further prolonged—with this new trial, and his
dreaded Summons—his probable arrest—the cloud had broken, and nothing
but resistance and the _Power of Riot_ remained to be tried.
While Longtinsky thus shattered Poni’s dreams of escape from the
spinning and tightening coil of circumstances, with a new bond of
ambition, six plain clothes men—detectives—gathered in the street,
and six more in the street beyond, and six upon Delancey and Grand
streets, waiting for orders, to produce Longtinsky in court.
And that night the plotters came. There were Madder, a strong thick
and undersized man, Felix a dark handsome Greek, Bomber a perverted
American, tall and slender with a curling moustache which he kept
waxed to the ends of its line-like length, and Putkof a Russian,
glowering, silent, and dangerous. Longtinsky pulled out his papers
from the drawer to which he had given Poni the keys, and sat among
them, and went over everything. Poni of course was there too. The
tough brigand was stupified with it all. His contempt for Longtinsky
began to change into a devotional admiration and wonder. The man’s
careful campaign, its parts and detail and the—monstrous audacity of
it all!
Longtinsky talked and talked, his apathy of manner had vanished,
the bulky frame shook with rage, and then the harsh voice ran on
accentuating point after point. At times he lost command of the
practical side of his Revolution, and he mounted into flights of
empty and floundering eloquence. This was the old Longtinsky as
Poni had known him, but the next minute he was outlining means and
ways with the skill of a born commander. Every thing was rehearsed,
suggestion from all sides heard; the reports were favorable, his
confederates were sure of their men. They had blinded their eyes
with promises, and infuriated them with denunciations. They would
act together, and the distracted city would surrender. Besides the
moment was auspicious; the military were for the most part away at
some annual military practice in Chicago. When Longtinsky heard this
he jumped to his feet, but instead of some voluble exclamation of
pleasure, he just turned to Poni, and spoke swiftly and softly.
“Here is the man I leave to represent myself; if I am to be
imprisoned consult with him. But Act, Act; leave nothing undone, and
strike together, Poni at the Court House—Remember Poniatowsky to be
THOROUGH—Bomber at Carrara, Putkof at the shipping, Madder and Felix
where they are wanted.”
He sat down, and there was silence—and yet—had their ears not
been deadened by the awful project that held them for the instant
speechless, and Poni amongst them, enthralled with the, to him,
utterly unaccountable magnitude of Longtinsky’s daring—had they not
been so enthralled, they might have heard a faint groan somewhere
above them as if in the ceiling itself. It came from Jessie. She had
heard everything; she had heard her father’s threat during the day
against Helen Lorimer, and she had heard Poni’s curse of her lover,
and she had heard that her father was about to be arrested, and she
had again seen the figures of the assembling officers of the law,
from her attic porch.
Her mind had been excited and restless for weeks. Things she felt
were drawing to a dreadful crisis. There had been goings and comings;
silently at night; long in the depths of the night. She knew that
men had slept in the little room which her father used for his work,
and had left in the mornings, she knew that in the cellar where The
Beehive was printed, there had been secreted strangers for days.
There was a sombre restlessness about Longtinsky; he had forgotten
often to speak to her in the mornings as customary, and she heard
him at night moaning—sometimes cursing—in his sleep, then shouting
orders. Jessie became terrified; about her was a thickening mystery
of anticipated terrors. And now;—she knew all—; in the crazy tenement
where the walls were not so thick that patient and acute ears could
not hear through them, there were also rents, and openings, and it
was through one of these directly over their supposed concealment
that Jessie, by removing a carelessly inserted block of wood, could
see and hear the conspirators.
The next day Mr. Moser resumed his case. The court room was packed;
the news that Longtinsky would be summoned, the probability of new
sensational evidence, the increasing half-realized conviction that
the case would go against the State; the comment—generally favorable,
often enthusiastic, sometimes, and in some editorial quarters,
sarcastic—upon the presence of Helen Lorimer; the sensation created
by her handsome companion, the unknown quantity of the new evidence;
all contributed to draw the people, and to add to the surprise that
the Mayor was not in the city. For it was currently understood that
he had interested himself in securing a new trial, and that this
again had been accomplished through the intermediation of Miss
Lorimer.
Everybody was on hand as the clock announced the hour for the court
sitting, and as the judge took his seat, and the court attendants
scanned the multitude for any infractions of the dignity of the
place, and the crier shouted his unintelligible formula, time-honored
and venerable, and always declaimed with the frantic impatience
of indifference to its immemorial usage. The eyes of the constant
visitors saw two new features in the court room; they were quickly
noted by every one; the big shapeless figure of Longtinsky, and the
singular elfin body of the boy Angelo Shimura. And curiously they
were seen in juxtaposition. Longtinsky, in charge of the Sheriff sat
to the left within the railing enclosure, not far from Mr. Moser,
and the child sat at the left side of the lawyer. Thus brought into
proximity the sombre, sullen, and disfigured face of the Anarchist,
surmounting a short, thick, and sprawling form, appeared more
conspicuously in the contrast furnished by the weird, long and
somewhat cadaverous boy with his copious black hair, his strained
eyes, and a pale face, on which glowed the suspicious carnation of
ill health in its pallid cheeks.
None watched this strange waif, thrown upward in the waves of
confusion and mischief, to rescue the innocent, with more love and
solicitude than the noble hearted woman who felt the danger of the
boy’s inexperience and his strangeness, and his alarm, in the midst
of this multitude, and in the glaring light of the public action. Her
heart truly grieved for him, and she trembled at the probable chance
that his story would not be believed, and that the relentless process
of cross-examination might confuse and intimidate him, and beneath
its pitiless exactions his tale—vouched for in her moral certitude
that he told the whole truth—would crumble away, and vanish,
fruitless and unfulfilled.
“Angelo Shimura take the chair,” called out the clerk, and the
hitherto immobile and inconspicuous body stirred quickly, and,
admonished by Mr. Moser, who followed him to his ordeal, walked to
the chair, or bench, was sworn and, concentrating his eyes upon
Mr. Moser, awaited his examination. To Miss Lorimer’s and Amato’s
surprise and great relief, the child seemed indifferent to his
surroundings. He scarcely noticed them; a glance at the observant
judge alone showed his realization of a singular position, while for
one instant he raised his face and looked towards Helen Lorimer and
Amato, who both encouraged him with a smile, and Amato pressed his
hands together as if clasping the boy’s own. That passed in a flash,
and the precocious child leaned forward as if really anxious for the
beginning of his testimony, his big head with its pale brow seeming
exaggerated in size, by the abundant hair covering it.
“Angelo,” said Mr. Moser in a low tone, “where were you born?”
“In New York,” the voice was astonishingly clear, and the words
spoken almost without a foreign accent.
“Where are your parents?”
“Dead,” without a quiver of feeling.
“How then were you brought up? Where have you lived?”
“Andrea Bocaglia and Michiela Bocaglia took me home and fed me.”
“You lived with them?”
“Yes Sir.”
Mr. Moser turned to two figures at his side, and said; “Andrea and
Michiela Bocaglia stand up,” and then to Angelo “Are these the
persons you mean?”
Angelo laughed softly, “Yes; they are.” The disconcerted and
perplexed couple looked at the boy with smiling faces, and took their
seats.
“Angelo” continued Mr. Moser “How did you live with Andrea and
Michiela Bocaglia?”
“I lived in the streets. They gave me food and I slept in a corner of
the room.”
“Did you go to school while you lived in this way?”
“Sometimes Sir.”
Then followed question after question, showing the vagrant life of
the child, his occasional weeks of attending school, his hours of
wandering through the streets, selling papers, or matches, or shoe
strings, his honest return of all the money he received to his foster
parents, his own frequent hunger, his obedience, his longing for a
better life—this told with a humble pathos that brought tears to the
eyes of Helen Lorimer, and many others, in the huge audience—his
meeting with a big man who gave him a book with pictures, and invited
him to his home, where he did a little work about the house, and was
paid for it, the good food he received in this house, from the man,
and his daughter, who was very kind to him, and then with an almost
preternatural grace and simplicity he told how his heart had grown to
this man and he loved him, how he followed him, watched him, listened
to him, and read—for he was precocious in this—his paper, which he
said the man printed, and how he learned there—in the paper—that this
man was going to free the people from slavery, and how he had one
great enemy—here the boy became confused, and the blood surged to his
cheeks, his eyes fell, and the tears ran down, and he wiped them away
shamefacedly, as he turned his head aside, and covered his eyes with
his arm. He refused to answer.
“What was the name of the great enemy of this man?” asked Mr. Moser
coaxingly.
The boy was sobbing, and there was a murmur of sympathy in the crowd
before him. Mr. Moser approached nearer, and only the prosecutor
interfered to intercept his actual touching of the child, with
his hand; “Angelo answer,” suddenly thundered the hitherto mildly
persuasive questioner.
The boy uncovered his shrinking face, and whispered, “Miss Helen
Lorimer.”
There was a wide spread motion in the audience, and some who were
attending to Longtinsky saw his frame shiver, and his brows contract,
and his fingers clench. His head fell forward on his chest.
“Is this man here in this room to-day?” continued Mr. Moser, his
voice still high and resonant.
The boy looked at Longtinsky, and his face assumed the strangest
expression; there was contrition there, and self-reproach one might
have said, and then there followed it anger and contempt, and with
it, flaring up in the same glow of temper a kind of pity. It was
the face of an actor, the face of a fully developed human, of a
man; something foreign in its complexity to the face of any child.
The next instant Angelo had leaped to his feet, and pointing to
Longtinsky shouted; “There he is.”
It was one of the crucial moments in the trial, and, as if with one
impulse a tide of wondering and astonishment swept the people off
their feet, and hundreds rose in their seats, craning forward in the
direction of the pointed finger of the boy. And then something even
more unexpected happened. The dramatic pitch was given its finishing
intensity, for Longtinsky roused into some consciousness of the
possibility of creating a sensation, and always inflated with the
delusion of his importance, his mission, and his power, sprang to his
feet, slapped himself on the breast, and swinging round from the
judge, the lawyers, and the witnesses, to the audience also shouted;
“Yes I _am_ Longtinsky;” and in the voice, not ill adapted for
oratorical effects, sounded his imposing, ungovernable, conceit.
It was all so unusual, and unlooked for, that a stupefaction seemed
to seize the court officers, and even the judge, but with the
reaction in the audience of a wave of applause, sense returned; the
judge pounded his gavel, the attendants crushed Longtinsky into his
chair, and Angelo falling back in his bench sat silent and excited.
From this point onward the interest and power of the trial deepened,
developments followed fast, the picture of the operations of
Longtinsky and his accomplices came back to the boy, and with a
fierce restlessness and eagerness, and with unwonted skill, with
picturesque words, he drew the successive scenes of the plot, and
the plotters, and the impending dawn of the catastrophe, and the
catastrophe itself, forgetting nothing, recalling names, dates,
attitudes, incidents, until the seasoned judge gazed at him with
admiration, and Helen Lorimer absorbed and almost breathless fastened
her eyes upon him with a feeling of terror. It appeared to her too
exact, too remarkable, too, so to speak, theatrical.
He rehearsed meetings of Longtinsky and Polinck and other men in
the office of The Beehive. Inscrutable as it appeared this boy
had been present at many of them. He had secreted himself in some
instances behind boxes, trunks, and under tables. He confessed to
a distracting dread that somehow he would lose the man whom he
strangely loved—Longtinsky, and this arch plotter regarded him
without suspicion. He had even invited him in to the room when the
means of destroying the Settlement House were talked over.
He followed Longtinsky in the streets at night; followed him to many
conferences and meetings elsewhere, though he made it clear that
Longtinsky was unwilling to leave his office, and, like a spider
in a web, feeling all the threads of his snare, living at its
very centre, concealed, himself, and lived a subterranean life. He
passed from point to point, drawing nearer and nearer to the last
arrangements for the destruction of the House, and the placing of the
bombs.
Here Mr. Moser proceeded with caution, getting all he could from the
boy, and retracing his steps, as if to confuse the young witness, but
never succeeding. The boy’s memory never flagged. His nervous force
maintained his strength, and it was evident to Amato, how wisely Mr.
Moser had acted in adding all the physical strength possible to the
frail frame, by his summering him in the exhilarating north.
Helen Lorimer thought she detected a kind of overweening pride,
almost a boastfulness in Angelo, as he felt the scenic pressure so to
speak of the crowd’s attention, the absorption of the lawyers, the
intentness of the prisoners, leaning over to catch his every word,
and the growing dissatisfaction of the prosecutors, as he cleared the
ground for the denouement of the last incendiarism of Longtinsky and
his friend Polinck. For his narrative concerned them alone, and the
men tried for their lives seemed almost absent in the repeated scenes
he described of Longtinsky’s preparations.
The story had reached the point where the bombs were brought to
Longtinsky’s office, and where a strange man whom Angelo said was
not among the prisoners explained their make, and the method of
their explosion. On that critical night the boy had been thrown out
of Longtinsky’s house by Polinck, and had returned, creeping on
all fours to the door of the editorial room—the apartment in Grand
Street. It was a warmer night than customary, and a beating stream
of rain flooded the city. Crouching at the door which was left
unfastened, the boy, crazed with a diseased curiosity, and hungering
for the safety of his patron, had slowly pushed it in, and, half
protected against the rain, had overheard the last council.
The session of the court was drawing to a close for the day. Electric
lights were beginning to flash in the streets, and the judge called
the attention of Mr. Moser to the fact of the near adjournment. It
was not unnoticed by that gentleman who desired to rest his witness,
and begin on the next day the tremendous disclosure he had prepared.
He bowed to the court and said;
“Your Honor I will take the witness from the stand, after asking
him one more question,” and then advancing to Angelo, whose
strained excited visage became with each added memory more and more
enthusiastic and eager, he asked him;
“Angelo Shimura do you recognize the prisoners at the bar?” and
addressing the judge “may I ask that the prisoners rise for the
witness’ better inspection.” It was the first time that Mr. Moser had
called attention to the prisoners at all.
The men were ordered to rise, and the six with alacrity stood up;
Angelo also stood at the witness stand, and looked at them. Still
exalted with his sense of eminence, the boy called off their names,
in a clear musical voice, a voice that many had already noted as
peculiarly distinct and pure;
“John Dalzell, Pedro Vinta, Alonzo Fabrizio, Charles Bingo, Fred
Rinker, Lorenzo Polinck.”
“Angelo have you seen these men, the prisoners now before you, at the
house of Longtinsky at any time?”
“No Sir, only Polinck.” There was some half smothered exclamations
and the audience understood that the effective stroke was near at
hand. The order of the day was however over. There was one more
sensation to be recorded. The District Attorney and Mr. Moser
conferred a minute, and then Mr. Meldexter stepped forward, and
asked the court for the arrest and committal to jail, without
bail, of the person of Peter Tolstoy Longtinsky. There was a short
debate, and the judge assented to the retention. Longtinsky was a
prisoner. The clerk announced the adjournment the people rose while
the judge left the bench, and then the surge outward to the doors
began, and then too Longtinsky turned to the white chairs of the
empty benches, and saw there one figure watching him with a blanched
face. It was Poniatowsky. Longtinsky raised his hand and spread the
broad fingers over his head; the next instant he was roughly hustled
away by guards, and Poni hurried away to tell Jessie her father was
a prisoner. It gave him a singular elation. He was now Jessie’s
protector. But the next instant he remembered the compact, and that
night too he must meet Bomber, Putkof, Felix, and Madder, and the
rest. Longtinsky had given the signal. Should they risk the awful
adventure?
CHAPTER XIII
THE TRIAL (continued)
It had indeed been a curious study to the many watchers, the demeanor
of Longtinsky under the ordeal of the day, and the astounding
revelations thus taken from the mouth of a child. Many smiled at his
complete blindness, some doubted it, others simply watched the man’s
changing expression. There were times when Longtinsky gazed at the
boy—who for his part seldom looked at him—with an absolute stupor
of amazement; then he became scornful, and attempted cheap tricks
of inattention and weariness, and less frequently he leaned forward
fixing his blue eyes on the child, his face red with a tempest of
rage, as if to disconcert and intimidate the inflexible inexorable
little witness. Comments were numerous, and the gossiping groups of
men, the lowering glances of many in the streets as they heard of
Longtinsky’s arrest, the prodigious headlines of the evening papers,
the covert allusions to it in the plays at the theatres and the
manifest disturbance on the East Side where the police reported many
brawls and muttered threats, betokened the excited and ominous train
of interest.
It had been a matter of surprise to Helen Lorimer that her uncle
seemed to avoid the trial, and made few references to it at their
meetings. But on the day after Angelo Shimura had begun his testimony
his interest was aroused, and something, peculiarly, almost anxious
in his manner, amused Miss Lorimer and Amato as well. He wished to
know how the evidence went and while he interrupted his informants
with impatient comments upon the entire uselessness of the trial,
he took some pains to find out exactly the drift of Mr. Moser’s
examination of Angelo and what other witnesses might be called on
the side of the defense.
The day succeeding the first day of Angelo’s testimony promised
important developments. The boy had made an extraordinary witness,
the tenacity of his memory astonished the oldest court attendants,
and his impassive way, lightened up now and then with some burst
of excitement, kept his hearers in a pleasant state of expectation
that conduced to his popularity. His picture appeared in the papers
and he was the talk of the moment. Already it was half discerned
that Longtinsky and Polinck had endeavored to cover their tracks
by complete secrecy and that the men apparently involved with them
were ignorant accomplices. The doors of the court room were early
besieged, and as different actors in the trial passed in, a rush
forward of the multitude occurred, animated by a wild curiosity to
see the boy Angelo, for his name passed from mouth to mouth, and,
as crowds will, every arrival was hailed as the object of their
interest. At last he did come with Mr. Moser, and his ineffective
childish appearance, his slight malformation, and his oblique eyes
proved disappointing.
“Looks like a simpleton,” was the remark of a big man who almost
seized the boy, as Mr. Moser pushed him aside and shoved Angelo ahead
of him.
“Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings God has ordained wisdom”
was the quick and loud retort of Mr. Moser, whose sally was cheered.
Within the court room every one seemed in nervous suspense. Animation
prevailed among the attendants, and the streaming and crushing
crowds were nervously excited. This tension became contagious. It
was felt as an atmospheric disorder, and Helen Lorimer and Amato
no less than the most sensational news monger acknowledged its
disconcerting influence. The judge was early on the bench, the jurors
were unusually prompt, the lawyers in their place, and the prisoners
as they marched in, stolidly looking neither to the right nor to the
left, when seated, bore an expression of expectation, indeed among
most of them it revealed itself in smiles of confidence. They had
not failed to note the overwhelming importance of the boy, Angelo’s
testimony, and with them too the increasing fear was the boy’s
power to withstand the cross-examination, and to vindicate his own
credibility.
Slowly the great doors were shoved together and the clamorous and
pressing throng without were shut off. The clerk stood up and
repeated his formula, the judge rapped impatiently and summoned Mr.
Moser to renew his case. One figure was not there; Longtinsky was in
prison, and Poniatowsky, again among the crowd felt that the moment
of action was upon him, and his conspirators.
“Angelo Shimura take the stand,” called out the clerk, who again
swore the strange waif, thus suddenly thrown upward to confound the
state and the law.
The examination had reached the stage where the witness was expected
to detail the incidents of the night when the fire and explosions
occurred. Everything had been carefully leading up to that; the
repeated conferences between Longtinsky and the bomb maker and
Polinck, and the final assignment of a date for the destruction of
the Settlement House, and the breaking out of the Revolution.
Pitilessly Mr. Moser gathered the evidence together from the lips
of the extraordinary boy as to the treasonable plots of Longtinsky,
and still in it all the persons of the prisoners, excepting Polinck,
never appeared. There were other men at the conferences and many
others unrevealed somewhere on the outskirts of the grand project,
but those men who had actually received their _condemnation to death_
for murder and arson were never named. It stupified the hearers; the
amazement grew. And Mr. Moser skillfully accented and accentuated
it dwelling again, in his examination, upon the possibility of the
boy’s mistake, calling his attention to the prisoners, pointing them
out, calling them by name and each time gaining from the alert child
a fresh denial of their complicity. Mr. Meldexter and his assistant
were visibly non-plussed. Their case seemed to vanish under the
breath of this boy into a veriest skein of smoke; their fabric of
proof tumbled to pieces before their eyes.
And Mr. Moser standing close to Angelo asked him to tell all he knew
about the night of the disaster. There was a breathless silence.
Almost a thousand eyes were fixed upon the immobile child who for a
moment closed his own as if to recall the vivid scene. Perhaps he
purposed too to make his story more telling. He began slowly opening
his eyes and staring at Mr. Moser.
“It was a eveening, veery—that Mr. Polinck and Mr. Longtinsky came
with the man—who put up the bombs. They came in the long room behind
the press. It was dark and they sat at a table with—one light. They
spoke low—Oh so low! but I back of a board on the side—and I could
hear Mr. Longtinsky say—‘To-night—To-night. Get Alonzo Fabrizio, and
Charles Bingo—They will carry these—to the Settlement House. Wrap
them up like a long roll—and tell them they are ROLLS of PAPER.’”
People stretched forward their heads to hear the words; one of the
lawyers for the state rose from his chair, and watched the boy;
the judge turned towards him more directly, and the jurymen leaned
forward with pale grave faces.
“Go on,” urged Mr. Moser as Angelo looked at him as if for
encouragement, “What next.”
“So Mr. Polinck—he go away and come back with Alonzo Fabrizio and
Charles Bingo. Mr. Longtinsky—he say—they take the ROLLS of PAPER to
the Settlement House for Mees Lorimer, and they go out with them.
Then they come a-back and say—How to get in the House?—and Mr.
Longtinsky say it was open—all open—all unlocked and they go out
again.
“Then Mr. Polinck veery much astonished; he ask how the House could
be open and Mr. Longtinsky speak so veery low and soft that I put
my head out of the board and hear heem say—the Janitor leave it
open—and then I could not hear what Mr. Longtinsky say—but Mr.
Polinck—he laugh, and Mr. Longtinsky laugh, and by an by—they go out,
and then I go out, and come behind running along on the other side of
the street.” Again a pause. “Well what next? Is that all?” and Mr.
Moser addressing the child looked about him, and back of him at the
sea of eager faces.
“Then come everything Sir. Mr. Polinck and Mr. Longtinsky—they come
to the men—out of the House—”
“What men?” interrupted the lawyer.
“Why Sir, Alonzo Fabrizio and Charles Bingo.”
“The men who had carried the rolls there as you said?” questioned the
lawyer, his face turned away from the boy and fixed upon the District
Attorney, who sprang to his feet and objected, but was overruled.
“Yes Sir, those men,” answered Angelo.
“Go on.”
“Mr. Longtinsky say to the men—the men who put the ROLLS in the House
to go away, and come back with other men and he give them some names,
that I could not hear—and then Sir, Mr. Longtinsky and Mr. Polinck go
in the HOUSE TOGETHER.”
“Now Angelo where were you?”
“I was behind a pillar at the door of the House and when they go in,
I go in too.”
“Then what?”
“Mr. Longtinsky and Mr. Polinck take the ROLLS, and carry them
into the cellar, and then Mr. Longtinsky fix-a-a-a-long a-a
cord—strin-like—to the ROLLS, and Mr. Polinck, he make a piles of
paper and things, and then Mr. Longtinsky say he go away for bizness.”
“Did you stay in the cellar or go away with Mr. Longtinsky?”
“I follow Mr. Longtinsky—always follow heem.”
“Did Mr. Longtinsky or Mr. Polinck see you there?”
“No Sir! it was always dark, and I mek no noise, and keep-a-out of
sight. I Sir like a leetle mouse.”
A titter swept over the crowd, as a breeze might ripple the dark face
of an engulfing wave—it was the wave of a darkening rage, the fierce
threat of revenge and contempt. Poniatowsky—still there—felt it—there
would be short shrift for Longtinsky, he knew, unless he and his men
struck surely, quickly, relentlessly. Could they do it? The titter
vanished with the sound of the judge’s gavel.
“Well what then?” murmured Mr. Moser gazing at the boy with a curious
earnestness.
“We stand—Mr. Longtinsky and mee—mee out of sight—some time outside,
and then the men come-a-back with other men—”
“What men?” broke in Mr. Moser.
“Why Sir, the men who carry the ROLLS.”
“You mean Alonzo Fabrizio and Charles Bingo?”
“Objected to,” shouted Mr. Meldexter.
“Sustained,” ponderously sighed the judge.
“Angelo,” again said Mr. Moser, “Tell us what men came when you and
Mr. Longtinsky stood at the doors of the Settlement House, and had
left Mr. Polinck inside.”
“Why Sir, Fabrizio and Bingo came with other men, and they saw Mr.
Longtinsky there and he say—to them, to go inside the House and to
stay there—that Mr. Polinck wanted them, and to come out when Mr.
Polinck say-a so—”
“Among those men were there—”
Mr. Meldexter was on his feet in a second. Mr. Moser recognized the
danger. Turning to the little Japanese, he spoke again; “What men
did you see among those other men who came with Alonzo Fabrizio and
Charles Bingo?” and his side glance at his opponent, after the usual
manner of a lawyer’s smiling effrontery, seemed to say “does that
suit you?”
“There was a-a-many men and there was,” the boy looked at the
prisoners which gesture made the district attorney and his men laugh
a little, just a little, enough to show their disgust; “there was a
John Dalzell, Pedro Vinta, and Fred Rinker. I see them—all Sir.”
“Now Angelo Shimura, tell all that followed that night.” And Mr.
Moser closed his eyes, folded his arms in front of him, and swayed
gently as if he expected to enjoy the recitation.
“Mr. Longtinsky hurry home—he almost run—and I follow heem. He get
in the door and slam it behind heem and lock it-and-a-a-I could not
geet in too. I seet outside and I there a leetle while, and I hear
big noise, I run out and many—many men and women run out too, and
then another big noise, and we run to the noise, and it came from the
Settlement House, and then we run faster and big crowds—all aroun—I
push thro, and see flames bursting up—shooting away up Sir, many men
scrambling out of the—holes—at the windows below—”
“Stop,” Mr. Moser opened his eyes, and appearing much confused said,
“Holes!—Holes! Do you mean the area ways in the basement?”
“Yes Sir—I mean that” no response, and the boy hurried on. “And then
came the police and they slam away and push back the crowd, and then
another bigger noise—Oh! so big! and it blow out the side of the
house, and the people get off—quick—and then come the engines—and
then more noise and the fire geet in another house, and then more
police and—I run back to Mr. Longtinsky—”
“Did you find Mr. Longtinsky?”
“No Sir—he shet up house—I no get in and so stay all night in the
streets, and the next day I see you at the House and you tek me away
and I tol you all.”
There were a few more questions, but only one that particularly
attracted the attention of the audience, and of the court; it was the
last Mr. Moser asked;
“Angelo Shimura, you are a Japanese boy?”
“Yes sir.”
“How did you understand these men—Longtinsky, Polinck and the others;
did they speak in English?”
“No Sir, they speak a most in Yeeddish.”
“Do you speak Yiddish?”
“No Sir,” the attorney and his men were on their feet, “but I
understan’ it.”
“Let us see,” said Mr. Moser reflectively, “Is the court interpreter
here?”
A dull looking short man appeared and said he was the court
interpreter and was so identified by the clerk. He was requested to
say something in Yiddish in the boy’s hearing and Angelo was told to
translate it. The experiment was made and the little Japanese quickly
gave the right meaning. After some more illustrations the judge said
he thought the fact of the boy’s understanding Yiddish was fully
proven. Then Angelo was excused by Mr. Moser, and handed over to the
district attorney. There was a stir through the great assemblage and
many feared for the little fellow. The apprehension was unnecessary.
The boy’s tenacity was like that of a vise. He forgot nothing.
He did not fence with the smart lawyer but he confounded him by his
sincerity, and the ordeal served the remarkable purpose of proving
the boy’s precocity and self-assurance, so that he could not be
regarded as a dressed and drilled instrument of the defence. It was
not long before Mr. Meldexter excused him; he was making things worse
for the state. There was a certainty in Shimura’s remembrance like
the inevitable action of a machine. It was observed by the district
attorney, who intended to impeach the boy’s evidence on the ground
that he had learned his lesson too well. The plea would hardly do.
There could be no gainsaying that the boy made an almost
unimpeachable impression. Many were the glances of satisfaction
exchanged between Helen Lorimer and Amato as Angelo showed his nerve
and steady frankness.
As Shimura stepped from the bench Mr. Meldexter suddenly, as his
face brightened with some unexpected suggestion, asked him to resume
the chair for a minute. The boy wonderingly returned, and as if
expecting some difficult ordeal prepared for him by the lawyer. Mr.
Meldexter was smiling, and this hypocrisy roused the boy’s friends to
a greater fear of danger.
“You say Angelo Shimura that the Settlement House was open that
night, that the rolls of paper were carried there by Bingo and
Fabrizio, and in your direct examination by Mr. Moser you said that
Mr. Longtinsky told Mr. Polinck that the House would be open. Did you
see the House open when the men carried away the Rolls there?”
“No Sir I deed not. I was at Mr. Longtinsky bit when I come
there-a-a-wit Mr. Longtinsky the door was open, and the Mr. Bingo and
Mr. Fabrizio come-a-a out.”
“You did not know that the door was not broken open?”
“The door was not broken Sir but—open like-a-a—” the boy raised
his eyes and looked around the huge chamber, searching for an
illustration, “—like a that door open now Sir,” and he pointed
down the corridor before him to the court room doors, one of which
then swung inward and admitted—_Theodore Lorimer_! His gesture was
followed both by Mr. Meldexter and Mr. Moser. Their glance caught Mr.
Lorimer’s attention, and those near at hand afterwards said Theodore
Lorimer’s face paled. Both of the lawyers turned again to the witness.
“You said something about hearing Mr. Longtinsky say to Mr. Polinck
that the janitor would leave the House open. Did you not?”
“Yes Sir—he say-a-so—he—Mr. Longtinsky.”
“Do you know the janitor of the Settlement House or the man who was
the janitor?”
“Yes Sir—veery well. He-a-sit-a-ther now” and the boy standing
pointed to a man concealed behind Mr. Meldexter. Mr. Meldexter
shuffled impatiently, and then after a moment’s silence told Angelo
to leave the bench. The boy took refuge at the side of Mr. Moser who
received him with great approval.
“John Bunn to the chair,” called out the clerk after prompting by Mr.
Meldexter. The man whom Angelo had pointed out as the janitor of the
ill fated Settlement House, rose and took the seat of the witness,
and also the oath. He was an ordinary type of serving man, perhaps
a German, stolid, unmoved by his surroundings and uncompromisingly
serene.
“John Bunn you are, or were, the janitor of the lately destroyed
Settlement House were you not?”
“Yees Sir I vas.”
“How was it that the house over which you had charge was left open on
the night of its destruction—or Sir—please be careful in answering—”
Mr. Moser had risen partly to object, “or was it open that night at
all?”
The man folded his arms, leaned back, and stared at the lawyer, as
if to assure him that he was ready and able to answer the question,
and in no way disturbed at the consequences—and, as he began his
answer, the figure of Theodore Lorimer stepped forward in the aisle,
and something straining and anxious came into his eyes. Few failed to
recognize that the question might prove critical, and Mr. Moser stood
at his chair as if to intercept some unexpected blow.
“It vas offen.”
“Were you there on the night of the burning?”
“I vas not.”
“How Sir, if the Settlement House was in your custody was it left
open and you not there?”
John Bunn was silent for a moment. He too had caught sight of Mr.
Lorimer standing now much farther down the aisle, so far indeed that
persons afterwards averred he raised his hand slightly, and as if to
catch the attention of the witness, and opened and closed it slowly.
The witness hesitated; he began to speak, and looking from the
lawyers to Mr. Lorimer and back again at the lawyers seemed in deep
perplexity. At that instant a court attendant touched Mr. Lorimer on
the shoulder motioning him to a seat. But that gentleman passed again
to the rear of the court room, and, with his withdrawal John Bunn
recovered his voice.
“Eet vas dees vay. I leef de House offen because I vas a—_told to
leef it offen_.”
“Who told you to leave it open?” came the remorseless question.
Amato and Miss Lorimer leaned forward; here was the suspected play
of the element in her own ranks that had helped—or wished to help,
for its own purposes—the revolutionary agitators. It had never been
understood why the House was unprotected the night of its assault.
The janitor—this same John Bunn—had refused to explain his absence,
and he had been summarily discharged—in fact he had soon absented
himself from the city; he could not be found, and his appearance here
was a surprise to Miss Lorimer, to Mr. Moser. To the question of Mr.
Meldexter the man returned a fixed stare almost as if he did not
understand him. Mr. Meldexter repeated the question, and added “Miss
Lorimer gave you no such order?” Again no answer, only the stare
and a stubborn shrugging of the shoulders. The District Attorney
approached the witness, and raised his finger threateningly; “Do you
refuse to answer this question?”
The man turned to the judge who had wheeled round in his chair to
notice him, and said “Must I answer?” The judge nodded. The man
recovered his equanimity; he had made up his mind. “No Mees Lorimer
gif me no such ordee. Mr. Theodore—he gif it to me—”
Amato turned to look at his companion. She was pale, so very pale
that the young man thought he should ask her to leave the room. But
she refused to go; her clenched hands were pressed to her bosom, her
wan look told her distress, and her lips compressed, as if almost to
stifle a cry of misery, were also pale. Quickly she released one hand
and laid it upon Amato’s, and half moaned; “Wait.”
The answer of John Bunn was a bomb that shattered some theories and
raised many questions. The answer incidentally was accompanied by the
scarcely apparent opening and closure of the court room door and the
disappearance of Mr. Lorimer himself. Perhaps but one pair of eyes
noticed his inaudible exit, those eyes were in the head of John Bunn.
Mr. Moser had his turn of astonishment, and Mr. Meldexter observed
his confusion with satisfaction. It half looked if this evidence was
to be trusted that Mr. Theodore Lorimer—a leader in the rich and
aristocratic circles of the city, a notable in _Carrara_—was himself
an accomplice, and the thought imparted to Mr. Moser a momentary
shock. What revelations might be expected from Longtinsky, where was
the trail leading?
“Mr. Bunn” it was the sharp voice of the district attorney, “did you
receive an order from Mr. Lorimer by word of mouth or in writing?”
“Mister Lorimer come to mee and say so.”
“Did Mr. Lorimer offer you any inducements for this betrayal of your
trust?”
“Vat you meen? Money?”
Mr. Moser had recovered his senses, he was on his feet shouting
“Objected to, immaterial, incompetent, and irrelevant.”
“Sustained,” hesitated the judge, adding, “at least at present.”
Again Mr. Meldexter; “Did you see the prisoners at the bar enter the
Settlement House on the night when it was burned down?”
“No Sir I deed not. I vas not there,” almost shouted the witness.
“Did you know why the House was to be left open; did Mr. Lorimer say
why you should leave it unprotected?”
An objection was made and sustained; Mr. Lorimer at present was not
on trial. Mr. Meldexter handed the witness over to Mr. Moser who,
after a moment’s inspection of the man, declined to cross-examine.
The evidence had no bearing on the guilt or innocence of the men
at the bar. But to Mr. Meldexter it served the vital purpose of
_revenge_; if Miss Lorimer, through her attorney secured the release
of the men previously condemned, he—Mr. Meldexter—had fastened a
dangerous suspicion upon her family, as collusive in the desperate
act for which they were tried. Would Miss Lorimer care to see the
matter through to its bitterest results? Already a court summons had
been made out for the appearance of Mr. Theodore Lorimer as witness;
_Mr. Meldexter wanted him_.
More policemen were called and a renewed effort made to show that
the prisoners were caught red-handed—as it were—coming out of the
burning House, but this evidence was somewhat shaken by Mr. Moser’s
cross-examination, whereby he showed a great difference in the
opinions of the witnesses as to where exactly they had seen the men.
It gave the impression of great confusion at the time, and made
it clear that of the many men who had been seen running from the
House many might have been in the place for purposes of rescue and
assistance. The boy Shimura had made it pretty plain that Longtinsky
and Polinck were the perpetrators of the deed and the others the
merest stool pigeons.
Finally came the time for the summing up, and the day closed with the
promise of both sides that they would complete their pleas the next
day in time for the judge to make his charge and for the surrender of
the case to the jury. Slowly with much whispering and open comment,
the great throng dispersed. Five left the court room with strange
conflicting thoughts. They were Helen Lorimer, Mr. Moser, Mr. Briggs,
Tom Ratler, and Poniatowsky. Helen Lorimer thought she saw the
treacherous hand of her uncle in another matter perhaps dearer to her
than the safety of the Settlement House; Mr. Briggs was dumbfounded
with a new sensation of danger to the commonwealth; Tom was thinking
of making away with Jessie now that her father was so desperately
involved in the thickening perils; and Poniatowsky saw the moment
near at hand when his ripened plans must be put in motion. Mr. Moser
felt the pressure of an ominous dread.
Surely of these five Miss Lorimer was to be pitied. The stunning
disclosure—although she could scarcely believe it—had wounded her
beyond all estimate. The revolting meanness of it, the shameless
perfidy, the cruel forgetfulness and wickedness of it, the harsh
sense of betrayal and desertion—Oh! how it made her value the
earnest love of her friend; she turned to him now as a protector, as
something golden and true, loyal and unswerving—these things stung
and wearied her.
She was silent almost all through their return to Carrara, and when
her home was reached she asked if her uncle was there. The servant
told her Mr. Lorimer had left in the morning and had returned an hour
before. Amato waited at her side and she turned and said, “You will
take dinner with us?” and then, as if in an impulse of affection,
“Please do.” Amato felt her grief. His own heart bled for her, and
his indignation rose steadily as he contemplated the heartlessness
that had wounded her—and yet it seemed all so incredible—perhaps
a mistake. He told her so. She thanked him and together they went
up the marble stairway, leading to the stately dining-room, and
there—coming towards them with a hand valise in his hand, a summer
overcoat thrown over his arm was—_Theodore Lorimer_.
For one instant Helen Lorimer surveyed him, not with entreaty on her
lips, not with expostulation, not with protesting confidence. She
KNEW, that moment when their eyes encountered, and he shrank like a
cowering animal from her searching inquiry, that he was GUILTY, that
he knew moreover that he had been revealed, that his name had been
published before the world as a culprit and a traitor—the Brother of
her Father. SHE KNEW IT. Nay; she knew more; he contemplated flight;
he was about to become a fugitive. It was best so. That house, that
city, would be too small now for him and her. Let him be forgotten.
Oh!—but her divination ran further, deeper—it was he that separated
from her the man she had loved; his pride, his arrogance, his love
of caste, and now how abject he seemed! It was amazing how much
she understood that moment, as if the fire of some supernatural
revelation had flashed upon him, and laid him bare to her. There are
such psychologic moments. Every one has experienced them.
Amato watched her. It was wonderful to see the muteness of her pain.
No word, only that fixed gaze, with a rising color in her cheeks.
And Mr. Lorimer said nothing. He fled before that stern silent
indignation. He was eager to get away, eager to escape a public
ordeal, that would have strangely humiliated him before his own
niece, before the man whom he had expelled from that house, because
he felt his own blood was—_a better sort!_
And yet there might have been explanations. Theodore Lorimer had
acted according to a principle. He was not a bad man in the moral
sense. His business instincts and his career in business had been
unimpeachable. His kindness to his sister and niece had been perfect.
He was the victim of a conservative and class pride. He had thought
to destroy the vicious activity of the radicals, to save his family
from any further pernicious—as he deemed it—sympathy with the Abyss,
to kill for once and all his niece’s infatuation to regenerate the
slums. It was a foolish deed; but not incomprehensible. He had played
a dangerous game and lost.
The destruction of the Settlement House had not disturbed Helen
Lorimer’s determination to keep on at her work, and the men—to be
dealt with summarily, innocent or guilty, as Lorimer thought, for an
example—_were to escape_. The whole fabric of his weak, unstable, and
cruel plan had failed. He had not been alone; he had confederates,
abettors, men of the same stamp of feeling; men with the same
egoistic idea. One shred of honor remained to him. He would not
expose them. He would take the burden of his dishonor and bare the
execrable shame of it, _alone_.
The man hurried down the broad stairway followed by Helen who stepped
rapidly forward to the top of the broad descent. At the bottom he
turned and looked back at her—and yet no word between them. His
face was convulsed with misery. For one moment a tide of compassion
swept over the woman gazing there at him, and seeing through him the
ulterior ruin of a life. Amato crept forward too, catching the epic
intensity of this wordless interview.
The next instant he was gone; an automobile already waited at the
foot of the terraces of steps, and in another minute the hoarse
creak of the chauffeur’s horn sounded drearily and—as it seemed to
Helen—like a human cry distorted into an unintelligible and animal
wail. The next she stood at Amato’s side and he lifted her face and
saw that it had blanched to the pallor of death. She leaned heavily
upon him; she would have fallen; he caught her and led her to a
sofa. She smiled at his solicitude, but her great eyes looked at
him despairingly—their bitterness of woe made his heart bleed. He
felt so helpless! But the strong heart conquered, the buoyant spirit
rose from its humiliation, the challenging splendor of her beauty
returned, and slowly—slowly—the intrepid resolve to bear all things
well, to suffer without murmur, and still to pursue her own noble
purposes unchanged, _also_ returned.
She rose and held Amato’s hands a moment in her own; he felt their
pressure. A few escaped tresses of hair hung upon her forehead, and
the breath from her parted lips came quickly. Her voice was low, and
as she spoke she looked upward, so that the white column of the neck
revealed its softly blue venations, and the eyelids drooped over
beseeching eyes;
“Amato it was Christ’s words ‘_In your patience possess ye your
Souls_.’” She wavered an instant, then she dropped his hands, and
now with bowed head, the spread white fingers of her hands pressed
upon her breast she left him stunned and sorrowing. He followed her a
few steps, but she swept from him noiselessly and quickly. He stood
irresolute a few moments, turned, descended the stairway, and left
the house.
Later he returned. Helen came to the dinner, and though she was more
silent she evinced her usual graciousness; her paleness faintly
touched with color added to her strange beauty. She talked with less
animation: she seemed to invite his confidences, and tempted him to
tell them of his sojourn in Europe.
Julieta remarking the absence of her uncle asked; “Where is Theodore?”
The deep eyes gazed a little wearily, Amato thought, at his vacant
place and the answer, uttered without a tremor, came from her lips;
“Mother, Uncle has left the City.”
CHAPTER XIV
THE GREAT RIOTS
It was impossible to admit the crushing mob that besieged the court
room the next day. Forensic skill has always appealed to the American
mind, and the duel of eloquence and argument, which was expected,
would have awakened the curiosity of a far less apathetic public. As
it was, the court officers, the lawyers, witnesses, principals, and a
few favored auditors—among them Helen Lorimer, Amato, Mr. Briggs—were
admitted quietly at another entrance, one leading into halls and
exits upon Centre Street, removed from the approaches from Chatham
Street and the City Hall.
When the doors at last swung open, a stormy crowd rushed in, and
filled to overflowing, in a short time, the large accommodations, and
yet beyond the doors clamored and struggled an even larger impatient,
unsatisfied and vociferating throng. It required some rude force to
eject a section of this crowd which had unadvisedly forced its way
into the court room. Amid adjurations, entreaties, threats, and cries
of derision, the surplus was expelled; the doors were then closed,
and the multitude awaited the approach of the judge. He was announced
by a toll upon a bell, and the immense assemblage rose together with
the sound of a rising wind, with all those within the rail, standing
until the Clerk had repeated his form of words—uttered perhaps at
this thrilling moment with more expressive intonations—and the judge
had gravely sunk into his chair. A few minutes’ consultation, an
uneasy flitting to and fro of clerks and messengers, the bending
together of legal heads in conference, the shuffling of papers,
momentary short announcements, rulings by the judge, and then Mr.
Meldexter arose, and facing the judge, told of his inability to serve
a summons upon Mr. Theodore Lorimer, as that gentleman had suddenly
absented himself from the city.
The evidence of John Bunn the previous day, as to Mr. Lorimer’s
apparent intrigue with the anarchistic demagogues had been fully
understood. It created a new, terrible, sensation. To the dangerous
plans of Poniatowsky and his associates it proved helpful. It
engendered a deeper hatred of the class, which these men said, thus
attempted to lure them into a trap and actually prompted them to
crime—in order to secure the vindictive denunciation and revenge of
society which this same class was supposed to be so adorably devoted
to, which it so righteously defended, of which it was the great moral
ornament. And to Longtinsky’s views of Miss Lorimer it seemed to add
particular force. Was not this Mr. Lorimer her uncle? It was all of a
piece. Her pretentious benevolence was a still darker scheme for the
extermination of the radicals. Of course such a perversion of meaning
became current only among the irreconcilables, but it even shook the
confidence of her humble friends.
And among the conservatives this exposure produced an effect
bordering upon panic. It placed them in a ridiculous position. It
allied them with the worst enemies of decency. It overwhelmed them
with contempt. The repudiation of Mr. Lorimer’s act and an almost
fierce anger for it, appeared in the organs of the conservatives, and
Miss Lorimer’s instigation to this was not wanting. The night after
her uncle’s flight she had sat up writing and preparing a statement,
communicated to the papers for the next day’s issues, disclaiming the
act of Mr. Lorimer, and displaying her own sorrow and humiliation
that the shameless deed had proceeded from her household. It was a
quick, skillful move. It cleared her in the eyes of all honest,
right judging men. It met the eyes of the Mayor who had heard of the
whole episode in the trial, and heard too later, of Mr. Lorimer’s
escape. He held the paper a long time in his hands reading and
rereading the statement of Helen Lorimer. He wondered if he might
return. HE, TOO, HAD BLUNDERED. On the day of the summing up of the
case the Mayor had come back to New York. He was in the City Hall
when Mr. Meldexter addressed the court.
It was impossible that some trace of elation should not color his
feelings that morning, mingling with a real sympathy for Miss Lorimer
and, mingling too with the flaming upward of his love and a better
hope.
When Mr. Meldexter made the announcement of Mr. Lorimer’s
disappearance there was a considerable straining of necks, and
focussing of eyes upon Miss Lorimer and her friend. Amato seemed
more conscious of this inspection than Helen. She did not resent
the inquisition. She was grave and undisturbed. Many thoughts, far
removed from all the occurrences about her kept her mind busy, and
perhaps quickened the pulsations of her heart. At any rate the
ferreting eyes were not rewarded with any display of confusion, and
soon their repulse sought a compensation in the proceedings before
them, after a warrant for Mr. Lorimer’s arrest had been signed by the
judge.
Then began the struggle. Mr. Moser rose for the defense. His manner
was suave, insinuating, and deferential, at first. He pointed out
the disadvantage of his position, the inevitable prejudices he
confronted, his solicitude for the State’s welfare, and his fixed
desire to be just. The word stirred him to a broader flight of
rhetoric, and he drew a picture of Justice in a great Commonwealth.
The theme offered many advantages of elaboration; it particularly
helped him to disarm criticism, when he affirmed the rights of
the poorest as well as of the highest before the majesty of the
blindfolded Genius that made no distinctions between the master and
his servant, in her solemn and righteous adjudication.
Mr. Moser dropped his demeanor of apology. He began to become
assertive, a little defiant, and finally scornful. Were these
unfortunate men to be hurled into eternity to satisfy the
Juggernaut of a remorseless public vengeance? Then came analysis
and description; he was merciless in his derision of the police who
must find scapegoats for their satisfaction; he poured forth the
vials of his wrath upon Longtinsky, dwelling with effective emphasis
on his secrecy, his turpitude, his impenetrable selfishness, his
preposterous vanity—and then, moving softly from point to point,
weaving his allusions with facts, coloring his facts with emotion,
he came—as if stupefied by his own discovery—upon the boy—the little
Japanese wonder—Angelo Shimura.
Ever cautious and apprehensive he drew a wonderful picture of
Japanese mentality, the precocity of their children, the steadiness
of their nervous temperament, and then in an entertaining narrative
style described his meeting with the marvellous child whose evidence
he begged now to rehearse. He had been excellent throughout. Here he
surpassed himself. The note of pathos was not overstrained, and the
claims of indignation not ignored. He dwelt in corroboration of his
belief in the boy upon his absolute consistency—and he was not loth
to express his wonder at the singular reticence, so to speak, of the
district attorney’s cross-examination of this witness. He depicted
in picturesque terms the boy’s strange yet beautiful devotion to his
benefactor, and how still more strangely his devotion became the
instrument of justice. All depended upon him. Believe him and the
innocence of three of the prisoners was proven, the contributory
guilt of two others revealed, the absolute conviction of one—the vile
instrument of Longtinsky—only possible.
He ran over this state of things several times, throwing a softened
light upon the unhappy men who had been dragged into the toils and
nets of an arch-villain but, turning the glare of his exposure upon
the unspeakable Longtinsky. And then when he had thus left on the
minds of the jury only the overwhelming impression of this man’s
guilt, he swept into a higher region of reflection—and he went there
guided by Helen Lorimer, whose own words fell upon her ears with an
unexpected freshness. He drew a picture of the State rocking between
the struggles of two parties, he dwelt on the dangers of mistakes,
the immitigable contest in the advancing process of political change,
between a dangerous demagoguery, insane, violent, ruthless, and the
preservative principles of property, a stage of civilization attained
only through centuries of persistent effort against the confiscatory
violence of kings, barons, and conquerors; and now again endangered
by a reckless appeal to prejudice and passion, luring on into revolt,
the blind forgetful populace, whose own rights and opportunities
would disappear in the seething ocean of unrest, anarchism, and
spoliation.
Mistakes in justice, the condemnation of the innocent, the surrender
to popular clamor of the guiltless, a careless control of our own
resentment, would only jeopardize order and bring on a blind mutiny,
in which the institutions of society would disappear—destroyed by its
own imprudence. The lawyer made his point well, and, advancing to the
jury forcibly challenged their own sense of security, if, in this
case, they failed to do justice.
Mr. Moser was listened to with wonder and delight—he was amazingly
successful with the audience. Mr. Meldexter congratulated him as
he closed, and as he opened his own case for the people, continued
his congratulations with a more formal tribute to the greatness of
his rival’s effort. He warned the jury against the blandishments
of rhetoric, and asked for their sober unbiassed judgment of the
evidence—reiterating slowly their solemn pledges to abide by that
for the Truth’s sake! Mr. Meldexter was not an orator, nor did
he possess the art of limpid and entertaining discourse, but he
was shrewd, raspingly cynical, and bright in argument. He saw of
course the point of attack,—the Japanese boy’s story—and on that
he expended his skill, against that he launched his batteries of
sarcasm; had this remarkably well-drilled child told the truth? Did
he care whether he told the truth or not? How did he know that the
prisoners had not assisted in setting the House afire? He had left
the place with Longtinsky before the explosion. In that time what had
happened? Bingo and Fabrizio certainly carried the instruments of
destruction to the House, the other men had been sent for, Polinck
and they were there together engaged—perhaps with different degrees
of intelligence—in the work of destruction. They had been caught by
the police red-handed. That they had never been seen by the boy at
Longtinsky’s conferences—assuming that he told the truth, assuming
even that he was at these conferences at all—proved nothing, least of
all their innocence.
The facts must be reasonably interpreted, they must be interpreted by
Common Sense—no distortion springing from a neurotic fancy, lodged in
the deformed body of a Japanese infant should be allowed to distract
their—the jury’s—mind. These men were known to Longtinsky, they
were birds of one feather; this precious sneak of a boy knew their
names and recognized them as members of the plotting fraternity, in
which his own improbable romance placed himself. They had been found
guilty by the condemnation of one jury of honest and devoted men—let
not the sophistry of eloquence nor the depraved insinuations of a
diseased and treacherous puerile human freak disturb that conviction,
and subject the State to the ridicule and danger of caprice and
inconsistency.
Remember this boy so beautifully extolled by the defense; what
confidence would honest men put in the story of a self-convicted
ingrate. Were Longtinsky and his confederates such assured idiots
as to allow this creature full access to their deliberations? Could
anything be imagined more improbable? Regard the whole tale in the
light of their own experiences as men of the world and see its utter
futility!
This destructive criticism fell upon attentive ears also, and was
given its due weight, so that when the pleas were finished and
the day—which had grown dark and rainy—had well advanced into the
afternoon, the audience felt itself uncomfortably incompetent to make
up its mind. The same puzzling uncertainty doubtless would afflict
the jury, and a disagreement was promptly predicted. Helen Lorimer
and Amato felt the singular sway of the adroit counsel, and, except
for their anxiety, would have acknowledged it as a new proof of the
futility of history. It would have, under other circumstances, amused
them. Now they scanned the impassive faces of the jury for some
intimation of their secret thoughts.
The next instant the Judge arose and the Jury—rising for a moment
from their chairs, which they resumed upon a motion of the Judge’s
hand—turned their eyes upon their legal monitor with an expression
of profound, almost appealing interest. From his lips they expected
the advice and direction that might lead them to a right decision. It
seemed almost as if the entire assemblage shared their expectancy.
Not a person left the hall, and in a deep silence the solemn
utterances of the judge sounded almost weirdly distinct. It was
noticed that the prisoners—all except Polinck—evinced an animated
attention. Their hearts were not beating with more nervousness than
did the heart of the woman who had made herself their champion, and
who also realized the critical moment, and to whom the whole episode
had its political philosophical consequences, written in large
characters before her eyes.
It seemed so evident that the weight the judge would assign to the
testimony of the boy Angelo Shimura, would be the pivotal point of
the trial that every ear was strained to hear his word at this part
of the review. A silence of portentous significance fell upon the
great throng as the dull November afternoon darkened, and heavy gusts
of wind carrying rain splashed the windows, whence the trickling
currents just audibly mingled their murmur with the slowly and almost
sternly uttered sentences of the charge.
Helen Lorimer’s whole enthusiastic temperament was now aroused.
She had taken up the cause of these men with ardor; the trial full
of color and situations had excited her imagination, and her heart
anxiously—hungrily—yearning for alleviation through her mind’s
interests, found in the dramatic progress of the trial a wonderful
assistance. She had staked so much upon it; it was in a real
way her own splendid effort to avert injustice, and there was a
propagandist’s zeal in her industrious interest. She had followed the
trial with intellectual fidelity too, and her conferences with Mr.
Moser were always helpful to that adroit lawyer.
And—there was something more—there was the faithful sympathy of a
friend, the loyal agreement of her handsome companion. This was not
an inconsiderable joy. Amato was winning his way, and his patience,
his quick insight, his endless ingenuity, above all his sincerity,
and the really delicate culture of his mind impressed her, and the
impression grew warm with a friendship that it would have really
made her sad to break or lose. Amato on his behalf plunged into
the trial with zeal. He knew the evidence, argued the points, felt
his eagerness increasing day by day to see the end, and responded
instantly to all the diversions and evasions of the lawyers.
This mutual enthusiasm brought on an inevitable approach to
confidence with Helen Lorimer, and both—one with anticipation, the
other without suspicion, at least without analysis—continued it to
deeper and deeper consequences. Both had been present each day at the
trial, and they had been welcomed by the great crowd as a social
feature that added to the trial’s importance. Representatives of all
shades of opinion and standing were present, and the trial began
somehow to be regarded as a political crisis.
A sudden increase in the rising storm outside, made the judge’s
words almost inaudible to those against the wall of the court room,
and they engaged themselves in the corridors pressing forward down
the aisles until, almost unobserved, each was filled, and curiously
the attendants desisted from any effort to clear them. Helen and
Amato, the lawyers, the few witnesses within the rail, the jury and
prisoners, the multitude, heard these solemn words:
“And the evidence of the Japanese boy Angelo Shimura is crucial. Your
verdict must be almost solely determined by the credence you are
willing to concede to that testimony. The boy is qualified by age,
by evident mental qualifications, to give testimony. Its value is to
be determined by its consistency, its resistance to the demolishing
attacks of the cross-examination, and by such support as the other
evidence in this trial afforded it, or by such contradictions as
it has suffered from the same. This evidence is peculiar—” and
then carefully, with impartial acumen, the judge took up Angelo’s
story piece by piece, pointing out with cold indifference—so Helen
Lorimer thought as she felt her heart rise and sink again—that
“the circumstance was almost unprecedented of a boy’s precocious
constancy, and his secretive habit, binding him to such a patron as
Longtinsky, being known—and an inference prejudicial to his veracity
might on that account be entertained. And yet again, looked at as
evidence, the story had borne examination, it had not been actually
contradicted, and remained a substantial factor—indeed the one
overpowering feature of the trial. The jury’s duty was to carefully
examine this testimony, to absolutely place it in the foreground of
their deliberations, and if they believed it their verdict was to be
unmistakably one of acquittal at least as far as it exonerated some
of the prisoners. But there should be no extension of its application
to others.” A few less relevant directions and the grave judge bowed
to the jury, and dismissed them—just as the storm outside with sudden
fury smote again upon the windows and the startled audience rose to
their feet to leave.
And now there was a crush to the doors, and the crowd with
oscillations to and fro, began their tumultuous exit. Helen and
Amato remained seated. Mr. Moser was with them and invited them to
seats within the rail, where other persons had gathered, hoping that
perhaps a verdict would be soon reached. This anxiety was shared
by a number, and while, for different reasons, they all regarded a
decision as probable within an hour or so, it was Helen Lorimer’s
intense personal interest that kept her there, persuaded too by Mr.
Moser to see the denouement of the great trial.
And while they sat together, talking in low tones, events were
happening outside of the Court House which would soon precipitate
the greatest social crisis the huge city had ever known. The Mayor
had returned to the city as we have recorded. He had followed the
daily reports of the progress of the trial, and had timed his return
almost to the moment when the opposite counsel began their pleas.
It was indeed a little before that, as Mr. Meldexter asked for the
arrest of the absent Mr. Lorimer, that Tom Ratler was whirling—the
second time that day—the Mayor to the City Hall, where Mr. Briggs
awaited him—impatiently walking up and down the historic Governor’s
room—staring out of the windows, and muttering words of disgust and
anger. His eyes eagerly perused again and again a paper which he
rapidly folded and unfolded, and which had the effect of eliciting a
running comment:
“Yes, of course—just as I supposed—the blow is well timed—and the
troops away!—but it can’t be so serious—a little contraption—a
small eruption—and yet, damn it—if the Mayor hadn’t run
away—impracticable—head-strong—visionary—we may be in for it now. Ha,
here he is!”
The last words were directed to the figure of the Mayor passing up
the steps of the Hall, while a portion of the escaping throng from
the Municipal Building standing in the slashing rain with outspread
umbrellas, watched him for an instant, and then turned and mingled in
the running, stooping, dodging lines of people hurrying against the
vicious wind and water that slanted the trees, and whirled and spun
in silvery threads about Printing House Square, and the tall façades
along Park Row, and over the towered structures between Broadway and
the Hudson River.
Tom Ratler rushed his machine into a garage on Chamber Street, after
being told to be instantly ready for the Mayor’s return. The Mayor
burst into the Governor’s room. He met his Secretary, shook his
hand and pushed into it a paper which he pulled from his pocket,
saying: “I received that this afternoon. What do you think it means?
Anything?”
As he thrust the unsigned paper into his secretary’s hand the latter
saw in a second that the Mayor was the recipient of a warning
identical with that he himself had just received and read. The writer
of both was undoubtedly the same person; he had addressed one letter
to the Mayor at his home, the other had been sent to the Mayor’s
secretary. The identical letter was calm in language, and possessed
a certain internal stamp of sincerity and veracity from its very
calmness. It ran:
“On ... an attempt to overthrow the government of this City will
be seriously made. It is not a trivial outburst. It has been well
planned, will be well supported, and unless you meet it with force
and severity will effect enormous damage to the city. It will begin
by an open insurrection and by an attack upon three points of the
city—the Municipal Building, Carrara, and the Shipping along the
river fronts. The conspirators are well armed. Treachery has supplied
them with arms from an armory in this city. It is the trump card-play
of Socialism. Red placards throughout the city will announce and
defend it. Remember! it begins on the afternoon of....”
And while they thus read the warning, throughout the city in the veil
of the storm, the placards were indeed posted, as though sown upon
the fences and the sides of building and on the pavements by that
tempest that now began ominously to rise and roar around them. Those
placards, the effrontery of Longtinsky had already planned, they
were printed in the office of The Beehive, they were the frothings
of his bittermost hatred and envy, and the malign fury of their
denunciations summoned the nether tides of discontent, and the great
silent columns of the despairing to break forth into RED REBELLION.
The Mayor and Briggs looked at each other for one moment. Something
in the face of his secretary convinced the Mayor. Briggs mechanically
held up for the examination of his superior the paper he had
received. Then the Mayor hurried to his table, saying as he stood
there, “At any rate action must be quick. Send all police reserves
here. These blind hints must be our guide.
“Telephone the police. Summon out the Fire Department and let them
patrol the water front; every man armed; raise the two remaining
regiments of militia now in the city—the 69th and the 22d; rush them
to Carrara.”
Mr. Briggs jumped to the phone. In another instant the police army
would be marshalled. The Fire Department was ordered out pell-mell by
the same voice, and it shouted commands to the Colonels of the 69th
and 22d regiments to assemble their men within the shortest possible
time at their armories. The orders were understood to come from the
Mayor—explanation would follow—instant obedience was imperative.
In the meanwhile the Mayor dictated to an assistant a short
statement—one was sent on the wings of the wind to the Chief of the
Police, another to the Fire Department, and a third and fourth were
despatched with lightning speed to the colonels of the regiments. The
forces of defence were already acquainted with the nearness of an
unknown danger—the machinery of the city worked with instantaneous
swiftness—but though summoned the battalions of Order could not
instantly be mobilized, nor was the mere notice of danger sufficient
to give intelligence to its leaders.
The plans of action were unformed. Resistance to an attack was the
only clear notion entertained—but attack, Where? How? and When?—; the
unsigned paper in his hand was the only clue the Mayor possessed. Had
he been recreant, careless, had he suffered his suspicions—frequently
appealed to—to sleep, and now was his great charge, the beautiful
city of the centuries to undergo disparagement and disaster? The
Mayor clenched his hands and sprung to the windows where the raging
elements seemed to gather to protect the mysterious treason about
them. Tears almost forced themselves to his eyes, and through the
tears—somehow palely seen—came the face of Helen Lorimer.
Gazing blindly before him the Mayor suddenly saw the flying figure of
a woman mount the City Hall steps, and he divined her mission. Almost
the next moment she stood before the Mayor, streaming with the rain,
breathless, with pale cheeks framed in the folds of a shawl thrown
around her head. It was Jessie Longtinsky. Mr. Briggs recognized her.
He knew her message before her lips opened.
“Sir—Mr. Mayor,” she cried, “_to-day_, this evening—_now_—your city
will be in flames. Poni, Putkof, Felix, Madder, Bomber—will do
it! Five thousand men are ready. They say so. Oh, Sir—I am Jessie
Longtinsky, I have heard all. Do something or you are lost.”
Her stumbling words had scarcely been heard before the sudden thud of
an explosion sounded in their ears—it seemed crashingly near them—but
while their ears thus recorded the actual impact—something blindingly
bright shot through the window at their side. The group fell apart
while the sinister missile sizzled and expired at their feet, put out
by the rain that followed through the riven glass.
Indeed things beyond the Mayor’s or his strenuous secretary’s
observation had been hastening to desperate conclusions. With
Longtinsky’s arrest the conspirators developed a singular alacrity of
action, and a much more wonderful unanimity of plan. Longtinsky had
been right in one thing. The work of his organ had been effective,
and the conspirators found a serious state of discontent pervading
large masses. Poni discovered to his increasing wonderment that a
small army of enrolled men had been formed by the arrested editor,
who, suddenly, to Poni himself, loomed up as a real general. He
found also that Longtinsky’s choice of his assistants—Putkof,
Felix, Madder, and Bomber, had been excellent. They were desperate
characters with brains, and a fierce determination to wreck their
revenge for fancied wrongs—wrongs which Longtinsky’s subtle tongue
and pen kept ever before their eyes. It was a prearranged plan
that before the possible arrival at a verdict by the jury, which
all the plotters, and principally Longtinsky himself thought would
liberate the prisoners, _all_—except Polinck, and thus concentrate
the State’s punishment upon him and Longtinsky—before this verdict
was reached the outbreak should be begun. And it was. The fact was
most significant of the helplessness of even the most perfect system
of police supervision when craft and secrecy unite into a perfect
machine for the propagation of revolt.
The armies of disorder for once were trained, and their discipline
was dangerous. They came together from their hiding places in groups
and individuals, gathering silently like personal accidents in the
crowds of the city. From the cellars, the tenements, the outlying
districts in Long Island, and in the Bronx, from factory, and street,
from the corners, and the wharves, the yards, and the saloons; almost
as if by some poignant magnetism of motive and fore-knowledge, they
gathered. There were three hosts; assembled with instantaneous
precision like those investing and ragged tides that surrounded
the Constitutional Assembly in Paris far back in the days of the
Revolution. It was indeed a lesser sort of Revolution. Riot perhaps
more than Revolution, but yet stirring deeply in it was the essence
of Revolt. Briggs had long ago seen that, but as Carlyle wrote,
Revolution “is a thing nowhere to be laid hands on, to be clapt under
lock and key: where is it? what is it? It is the madness that dwells
in the hearts of men. In this man it is, and in that man; as a rage
or as a terror it is in all men. Invisible, impalpable; and yet no
black Azreal, with wings spread over half a continent, with sword
sweeping from sea to sea, could be a truer Reality.”
Its materialization was so rapid and forceful that it succeeded,
and the City was unprotected. What the Mayor had done was a measure
of safety, but a measure necessarily tardy and confused. The police
hurried their platoons together, and from station to station the
recruits came to the Headquarters, where they were despatched in
regiments to the City Hall. Already the Municipal Court Building on
Center and Chatham was surrounded by the mob, and in the black and
maddened multitude in the stormy afternoon were Felix and Madder with
explosives, with firearms and with the torch, and with them too was
Poni, who had discovered that Jessie had left the Longtinsky home.
He knew well why. She had discovered the plans of the conspirators,
and would betray them and—why?—why?—it turned Poni’s face into the
savagest snarl of hatred—because of Tom Ratler! The thought made a
madman of him, and the thirst of murder swept over him. He cursed his
luck; “let him meet that white cur, and he would butcher him like a
rat—Ay—he would do worse; he’d strangle him to death by inches; Damn
him.”
It was from a spur of the thickening force around the Municipal
Building that the rocket, that fell at the feet of the Mayor and
Jessie Longtinsky had been projected. And now—upon the deafened ears
of the little group in the Governor’s Room, the loud thunder of
explosions fell. The attack had begun. The imprisoned men and women,
who were yet waiting for the verdict of the trial, had suddenly
realized their danger when an attendant came running into the court
room, telling of the strange appearance of the square around the
building, and telling too their fears, that some attempt at rescue
was intended. Some escaped at once, while the heavy doors were
closed, and despatches were sent out for help and the rest—among
them Helen Lorimer and Amato—remained. The judge was himself among
those thus at siege. The prisoners were in cells in the basement of
the building, and Longtinsky among them heard the detonations which
promised him release. His friends had understood, the effort was
already on way. His face lit up with a fanatic joy, and again those
painted dreams of power and success and dominion swept him into a
furious delight.
Felix, Madder, and Poni had organized a mass of strong men, who were
their immediate supporters, and these had forced back the surge of
silent beings about them, while the leaders themselves shot the bombs
against the doors of the building. The explosions were terrific, yet
somehow their violence was wasted upon the doorways alone and the
clouds of broken stone and splintered bricks fell upon the heads of
the crowd. The huge iron doors yet stood.
The frightened and blanched group in the court room were standing
together when the sound of a bursting bomb crashed, and then it
seemed as if a shout of exultation arose, and with it the fall
of some heavy object announced the breached defense. And at that
desperate moment Helen just noticed that the storm was abating and
the rain beat no longer upon the panes of the court room windows, the
next a sharp command struck her ear: “To the elevators; the top of
the building. Wire for a balloon. Up! Quick! the mob is breaking in!
For God’s sake, hurry.”
It was true. After the first ineffective attempt the men grown bolder
crept a little closer and threw the bombs at closer range. Their
effect was tremendous; the great ornamented doors with their metal
knobs and grinning escutcheons shuddered and fell in. The mob broke
out in cheers, and rushed forward—but not far. The herculean men
chosen by the leaders still held them back, waiting for the orders
from Felix and Madder and Poni to advance. Some of those inside
noticed this with terror. A disciplined mob was a thing of dreadful
import. But on the inside there was still resistance. The marshals
and wardens, guards, and keeper, had hastily armed themselves with
such weapons as the place afforded, and they were not ineffective.
But one door had actually yielded, and this had so fallen as to make
a parapet across the entrance itself. It was a danger zone of real
extremity. Behind it the crouching defenders stretched themselves
with the muzzles of their guns over the harsh edge of the prostrate
parapet.
And in the meanwhile radiating intentions of skill and discernment
had become apparent in the ordered mob. Madder ordered a band to
seize the subway station at the bridge, and the City Hall, and to
break up all traffic, coming either way. His purpose was obvious.
He desired to keep back the chance of any relief, and to divert the
crowds for the upper city to other lines of service. Nor was this
all. He derailed a train on the Elevated and effectually blocked
that avenue of movement. Then came the shout that the police were
advancing down Centre Street in military form spreading across the
street from curb to curb. In an instant, a small company tugging at
some dragging object in the swaying mass pushed their way to the
head of that street, and confronted the new arrivals with a small
rapid firing gun. It was the only piece of ordnance the rioters
possessed—and it was not revealed to the hurrying police as they
came solidly up the low hill, until they were within the circle of
its deadly fire. Even here precision prevailed. A stern hard faced
man, a deserter from the army directed the gun’s use, and the timing
of its discharge was chosen with deadly coolness. The police were
not really aware of the hidden weapon, until, uncovered, it poured
its deadly fire upon them, and almost instantly it was followed by
a discharge of riflery from the hands of a long front of rioters,
who with complete composure ranged themselves along the street, and
aimed their rifles at the disordered and flying police. Many of
these latter took refuge in doorways, and under porches, and darted
into the side streets. They had drawn their revolvers and a sharp
rattling volley of bullets, punctured the crowd before them, but with
no serious effect. This repulse of the police delighted the mob,
and almost as soon as it was accomplished, Felix, Madder, and Poni,
had demolished the protection of the iron door, behind which the
defenders of the Municipal Building had screened themselves.
Two well directed bombs had overthrown the door, and had scattered
its little garrison, who dragged with them two dead men, and one,
badly wounded, while the rioters rushed forward after a minute’s
hesitation, with yells and cries of victory, chasing the guards
through the halls, swarming into the court room, and entering the
stairways that led to the prison cells below.
When the police advanced up Centre Street a detachment had passed
from Centre to Chatham, and another from Centre through Pearl to
Broadway. The former was intended to enclose the rioters, as the
Centre Street phalanx had engaged them, while the Broadway squad was
sent to the protection of the City Hall. The first failed entirely in
its object, as the singular foresight and preparedness of the rioters
was again evinced in the stationing of a body of men in the street,
and along the elevated railroad tracks in Chatham Street, who used
once more the guns, rifled from a city armory, upon the guardians of
the city’s order. The little prominence at Chatham Square was well
held. Drilled men, and fairly armed, seemed suddenly all over it. The
hillside on Centre Street was clear, not a figure stirring in it, and
only far away at Grand or Canal thick moving bodies of people, and
the daunted policemen, while the grim spectacle of a few lifeless
bodies caught the eye on the street near at hand, where the murderous
volley met the approaching officers. The detachment of policemen
intended for the City Hall had already been intercepted by an order
to wait and receive guns.
The surprise in Centre Street cautioned the captains not to lead the
men helpless against the armed mob. The City Hall remained undefended
and the mob leaders had not yet thought of its capture. The Mayor
yet stayed with the clerical force, some aldermen, and the heads of
a few city departments. All there was consternation and panic. The
night was now fast settling down on the city, the electric lights
sprung into activity, and the pale aurora above the city sent its
illuminating and spectral radiance over the streets. The rain had
ceased, but a dull clouded sky prevailed, and the raw wind began
to rise chilling and dispiriting, in which a few forlorn and
unaccompanied snow flakes made their appearance. With the Mayor was
Jessie Longtinsky, and Mr. Briggs. Tom Ratler was not yet summoned
from the garage. The Mayor expected protection from the police,
and he would not leave the Hall. Through the open windows came the
frightening sound of the repeated explosions, and afterwards the more
awful notification that the rioters were engaged in battle.
Already throughout the city confusion reigned. The news of the
desperate uprising spread from mouth to mouth, the wires burned with
their message, and from post to post the startling rumors gathered
terror and exaggeration as they flew. The vagrants of the city, the
unemployed, and the mischief makers of all brands and inclinations,
flocked to the scene of the disorders, and gave a deceptive
appearance of strength to the mutiny. Longtinsky had planned an
attack on the city at three points, so that the composure of the
citizens might be the most tried and the forces of defence more
divided. It was a bold plot and it was successfully accomplished.
Putkof, the Russian, worked along the river fronts, and started a
series of bad fires which, fanned by the wind, spread with terrifying
rapidity. To these points the Mayor already had directed the firemen.
But their efforts were confined to saving the neighborhoods, where
the devastating flames roared and hissed, sending upwards volumes
of sparks, and throwing upwards too the horrid red spectres of
incendiarism. Bomber had been sent up town to lead the assaults upon
the houses of Carrara, and where the villa of the Lorimers raised
its marble roofs, _there_ the insatiable Longtinsky commanded them
to wreak their utmost powers of destruction. There too the Mayor had
ordered the two regiments of militia now left in the city—the 22d
and the 69th—but the slow process of assembling the men allowed the
rioters to get the start, and commence their onslaught.
Despatches to Chicago whither the militia had gone upon a vast
holiday parade were hurried away; but the distance was great and a
day at least would elapse before relief from that quarter could be
expected. Even the forts of the City were without garrisons. This was
known to the leaders of the insurrection and they hoped, buoyed up by
the mad promises and delusions of Longtinsky, to receive some monster
accession of strength from the people, and that a contagion of
revolt would come to their assistance. At any rate let them destroy,
pillage, and then, if the worst was to be feared, concentrate and
retreat into the hills of Westchester and parley for POWER! This was
his fanatical promise, and now that they saw the Municipal Building
in their hands, the city emptied of defenders, the police repulsed,
the river fronts streaming with flame and smoke, and heard too that
the attack upon Carrara had begun, these madmen suddenly felt that
their hopes would be realized.
Yet, already in answer to the Mayor’s explicit appeal, soldiers were
forming in line and boarding the train at the stations in Chicago,
and the practising garrisons ordered home from Montauk. The Mayor
and the occupants of the City Hall knew of the extremity of those in
the Municipal Building; they could easily see the state of things
there from the uppermost windows of the City Hall. The Mayor’s
first thought had been for the safety of Carrara, and thither the
regiments had been ordered. It was expected that the police would
be able to dislodge the rioters, and when the discomfiture of the
police was learned, when the determined and prepared attitude of the
mob was seen, its undisguised control by thinking leaders, it was
realized that the moment the prisoners—and Longtinsky among them—were
liberated an attack on the City Hall would follow, and it also seemed
pretty clear that its fall would be a matter of a few minutes only,
unless help came. The telephone wires, worked desperately, brought no
answer. The continued absence of any police for its protection awoke
the worst apprehensions at first, until a message from the Police
Headquarters arrived, explaining the recall of the squads sent down
Broadway, and their slow equipment with guns.
Scurrying orders sent through the city had so far failed to secure
the necessary armament. In the confusion, from the suddenness of it
all, with the plain evidence of preparation, and of some associative
plan, involving large numbers, the Mayor and his advisers felt
powerless, until an actual physical resistance to the rioters could
be summoned. Mr. Briggs wanted the Mayor to leave the Hall, and unite
himself with the troops at their armories; this the Mayor refused
to do; his place he thought was in the City Hall. Indeed he would
confront the mob himself. If there was no help he would undertake to
speak and argue with them.
This Mr. Briggs protested against. It was a confession of weakness,
it was courting death, it meant nothing but disaster.
And during this time, while the men debated, anxiously watching for
the promised succor, the rioters were pouring into the Municipal
Building. Armed with crowbars, with wooden beams, with stones, with
almost anything, they battered down door after door, following the
guards into the last corridor in the basement, around the prison
cells, where the faithful wardens gathered, ready with their lives to
defend their charge. It was a frightful extremity. A handful of men
against a host, and yet they formed silently in a line at the foot of
the stairs which descended into the basement, where the cells were
built.
The agitated and blanched faces of the prisoners were pressed against
the bars of their cages; a few lights only were turned on, and in the
half illuminated gloom the reflections from the gratings, a glint
cast upward from the barrel of a gun, the wan spots of light on the
ceiling above the lamps, seemed to weirdly accentuate the awful
suspense.
The keepers, twenty in number, were well armed, with magazine rifles,
and they had ammunition. They were trained men, utterly fearless.
The stairway was narrow, too narrow for three men to descend it
abreast. The keepers thought the chance a fighting one. They might
hold back the mob for some time, a dozen dead men would choke up
the entrance; the police were doubtless rushing preparations for a
fresh descent; they had arranged a firing line of six, into which by
turns they would step, as each set exhausted their shots; the lights
left were nearest the stairs, so that the faces of their assailants
would be seen, and they were themselves screened in shadow further
back—and then—at the last gasp—there was a fair run for safety
through some passages to other cellars, to area-ways, from which, by
ladders—already there to be put into use—they might reach the street
outside and escape!
It was a bold scheme, bold to the verge of desperation, but it bore
some promise of success. As for the prisoners, one of the wardens
stood at their cages with a gun—it was no idle threat—_a sound_, and
the man making it was a corpse.
And now the raging torrent was heard above them, cries, execrations,
the tramp of feet, the breaking of doors and—they strained their ears
at the sound—something like the roar and crackle of flames. Another
crash—a shout, a titanic rise of laughter, and then immense tumult
of voices in which rose contentious cries: “The jury—the jury—Hang
’em—Hang ’em Hooray—No—No Keep ’em. Let the boys they tried have a
_go_ at ’em—Oh, damn it—hang ’em. What’s the use?”—then a sudden
silence.
The wardens wondered. It was true, the jury forgotten in the tumult,
had remained locked up, and now so uncomfortably relieved from their
imprisonment, were in the hands of the mob. Still no sound—a low
repetition struck their ears. Some one was speaking, perhaps in
expostulation, perhaps in command. Then silence again—and then a
storm of running feet and more cries: “This way—to the cells—we’ll
break the boys out. This way! Here——”
The wardens tightened their hold upon their guns—raised to their
shoulders, their muscles set in their necks, and their lips closed
hard. The man at the cells also raised his gun and speaking to
the figures who, motionless at the confines of their cells, had
simultaneously glued their eyes upon the narrow stairway, said: “One
word and you’re _all in_, any one of you.” Longtinsky alone was not
at the front of his cage. Somewhere in the half discovered background
of his cell, he sat upon a low stool, silent and benumbed.
And now they came tumbling down the steps. The door was full of
figures. Crack—crack—a flash of light, six flashes of light and
as many men fell forward, stark dead. The mob by reason of the
steep descent could not see the wardens, could hardly divine what
obstreperous obstruction they had encountered. The cries redoubled,
those in front pushed back, those behind forward; in the confused and
contradictory efforts many fell.
The wardens waited. Not a man in the struggling heap was armed, which
was surprising enough. Sticks only were in their hands. It would
have been a pitiless slaughter to have fired then, and no one had
yet entered the darkened cellar. Suddenly to their left in the place
itself, a hoarse wild cry—a cry of mingled insanity and fright came
to their ears:
“Save me—Save me—Longtinsky is here—here—Save me!”
And then a shot, the groan of death, a fall—Longtinsky lay a corpse
on the floor of his cell. But the wardens never turned: their eyes
still measured every detail of the daunted multitude on the stairway,
and the vigilant watchman paced slowly along the cells, with no
trace of the ominous scowl that had darkened his face as he heard
Longtinsky’s voice. Silence for an instant—and then again a plunge
forward of the crowd, and three big men shot into the space before
them. Once more a consentaneous movement, the crackle and report, and
all three fell back, dead, almost heaped together in the doorway.
Awful cries arose, and in the fierce declamation the stolid guardians
kneeling on the pavement, as yet unrelieved by the waiting marksmen
beside them and at their back, could distinguish with a shock, that
perhaps was only registered in a quicker heart beat, the savage
threat of:
“Bombs; Bombs—This way—Clean out the Rats; Blow them to Hell!”
Again there was a cessation of the tumult, and some strong voice
was heard cautioning; perhaps the rioters realized that the
prisoners would be blown to pieces too with their imperturbable
keepers. It seemed so. The stayed crowd on the stairway scrambled
back—and—peering forward the wardens saw the steps almost empty save
for the grewsome burden of the dead remaining on them. Perhaps five
minutes passed; then to their dismay they saw smoke curling and
floating in the basement room, and that rushing distant sound, least
perceptible before, as of the swish and pouring rage of ascending
fires came nearer. It was indeed Fire—Conflagration; now the smoke
began to gather in light veils and films, and it was rapidly
thickening. The rioters had left. Doubtless they expected the wardens
would be smoked or routed out, but how about the prisoners? how about
Longtinsky, whose liberation had been the motive of their attack?
There was another guess; the fire had been started somehow in the
ungovernable orgy of violence, and the rioters had deserted the spot,
careless now even of the fate of their friends.
But the wardens had little time to think over any plausible answer
to these questions—little more than enough time indeed to shackle
the prisoners, handcuff them, and retreat to the area-ways on Court
Street, whence they could reach the street up the raised ladders. And
when they crept up the ladders, climbed over the iron railing to the
street, to their stupefaction the street was deserted. They, huddled
with their prisoners, were irresolute. The flames were raging in the
magnificent structure they had left, smoke and sparks were pouring
from its broken windows, sinuous trails of light slipped from story
to story, a roar burst from the engulfing fires leaping up the shaft
with the stentorian might of the air’s pressure, and high up towards
the very summit of the building, black columns of smoke, dimly
smitten with reflected light from the ravenous blaze far beneath,
rolled tardily outward—and there—Good God! could it be possible!—the
wardens, in the ghastly illumination, saw on the edge of the roof—but
just discernibly—gesturing figures. Those figures were those sent up
to the attic in the elevators, and among them were Helen Lorimer and
Amato!
But there was scant time for deliberation: shots were heard in
rapid explosive succession. They seemed to come from the west, from
Broadway. The men hustled their prisoners over the street, surrounded
them, and marched rapidly to Centre. The shots were more distinctly
heard, and with occasional hoarse throated jeers. The City Hall was
beleaguered; the fight was for its possession. That seemed certain.
The wind was still blowing, though less violently, and the rain
had ceased, the clouds were rolling together into denser masses,
and here and there a star revealed the cleared sky. Starting on a
trot, forcing their prisoners on, the squad hurried down Centre
Street toward the police headquarters at Market Square and Broome
Street. One or two looked back at the deserted towering pile; it was
emitting red forks of flame from its windows, and murky clouds swayed
over it, streaming off in a stupendous blanket that took fantastic
outlines, beneath the glow of the electrical aurora—unchecked by the
disorders—that yet bathed the tall buildings of the city, with its
delicate refulgence.
The bitterest fight had already begun at the City Hall. Thither
all the resources of the police had been concentrated; the first
detachment, recalled for reinforcement and armament had returned to
the Hall, prepared to defend it, and to expel the rioters from the
Municipal Building. They formed practically almost a regiment. Their
dread had been the rapid firing gun of the rioters which had already
wrought such destruction among their comrades in Centre Street. They
came down Broadway, after their recall and replenishment with such
guns as the department could assemble, and had hastened across the
City Hall park as the rioters forced their way into the Municipal
Building. They were seen, of course, but they effected a lodgment in
the Hall, and prepared to defend it, being there placed under the
command of the Mayor. The mob at length ejected from the Municipal
Building by the raging storm of fire and smoke that now filled it,
had assembled outside, their swelling tumult being each minute
augmented by the additions of new arrivals of loafers, curiosity
seekers and sympathizers, the wild, ill disposed scum of the city.
This disorderly multitude filled the spaces around the Chatham Street
Hill, swarmed over the Printing House Square area, crowded into
Spruce and Nassau Streets, and were pushed up against the northern
and eastern ends of the City Hall. A recoil of those occupying
Chambers Street from the police had made a fierce jam about the
Record Hall, and it was then that the leaders, Felix, Madder, and
Poni, determined to actually precipitate a battle with the police
in the City Hall. Their first intentions had been to liberate
Longtinsky, and then rush the City Hall, and install the agitator
there as mayor. This had been planned already by Longtinsky himself.
There were almost one thousand men, and the Maxim; with these they
might capture the Hall, and the Mayor, who now they had learned was
within it. But they felt the need of a directive, formative, and
speaking mind. Proclamations and literary appeals were not in their
line. They recognized already the danger of disintegration. Something
must be done at once which would keep their forces together and win
them recruits by success.
“There are ink-slingers enough,” said Madder with an oath, “if we
only make the place safe for ’em.”
“Well, we’ll need ’em,” said the handsome Greek. “We may kill people,
but we can’t make ’em see things our way, unless we teach ’em.”
“To Hell with teaching,” broke in Poni, whose passion grew
insupportable as he thought of the capture of Jessie by the hated
Tom. “Get what we want and teach afterwards.”
“Yes, I know,” grumbled Felix. “But it’s win or hang with us; and
just killing won’t fetch it. Reason has a hand in the game too.
Longtinsky could have wiped their eyes with a little hot air. You
know that.”
“Come! Come! Right about and take the Hall! The Mayor’s there.
Perhaps,” Madder added with a sneer, “we can persuade him to say
something for us. Eh?”
Just then a clamor arose from the ranks of the little army, who were
still gathered in front of the Municipal Building, somewhat split
up into squads by the pouring and surging throngs around them, and
only recognizable by small red ribbons tied in their hat bands,
their only uniform, though the possession of a gun by each of them
told more plainly their confederation. This improvised army was the
whole strength of the revolution, together with the mass controlled
by Bomber, and soon to be engaged in an attack upon Carrara at the
north of the city. Rude and undisciplined, yet the mere fact of
their subordination to orders made them formidable. They had become
impatient with the delay at the Municipal Building, and the news of
the arrival of the police armed with guns at the City Hall daunted
them. The bolder spirits saw at once that action was necessary, and
it was their cries that now sounded in the ears of the leaders who
were parleying together nearer the Chatham Street side of the square.
The cries were answered quickly enough. Madder ordered the men with
the guns to form and surround the Hall. He stood for one moment
revealed above the shoulders of the crowd, standing on a settee. His
harangue was short and rough.
“Boys, we’ve smoked the rats out; everything is ours; All for
everyone and everyone for All; Short shrift for the satin coats. Take
the Hall; the Mayor’s in there. You know him. He set the militia on
you in the Strike. Perhaps you’d like to see him where he can’t do
much harm any more. Fight like tigers; you’ve got the Cops now. Let
them fry in their own grease. Down with Tyranny!”
This direct appeal was greeted with shrieks, imprecations, shouts,
and groans. The repeated cries were echoed from the edges of the
crowd, and rolled in and out again, in a wave of rising sound, that
brought the little garrison of the City Hall to the windows and
doors, and told them clearly that the fight was on.
Indeed it was. The rioters were now thoroughly inflamed. Their
success with the Municipal Building, despite the loss of their
friends, the prisoners, had driven them mad, and the easy access to
liquor, begun by the breaking in of a few saloons, had added the fury
of an insane insolence to their zeal. This with many, but there were
many more to whom this effort meant a serious and heroic struggle for
the overthrow of a wicked and cruel State. Longtinsky had instilled
the sullen rage of his own fanaticism in many, and in many more this
rage was mingled with strange delusions of happiness and ease.
The day had progressed and the tolling of the belfry of St. Paul’s
announced the hour of eight; there had been no interference with
the lamps that converted the park spaces into vivid escutcheons
on the dark neighborhoods, and the streets into gashes of light.
Crowds of adventuresome men and with them—by the purest caprice of
contradiction—a few ambitious and careless women had come down town
to the City Hall, and occupied spots of observation, while many more,
emboldened by their fears of danger to property, had hurried to their
stores and office buildings, gathering with them such improvised
forces for protection as could be hastily summoned in the increasing
tumult and dismay of the whole city. These were not ready to become
helpful; their intent was only self-protection.
The force of the rioters led by Madder, Felix, and Poni, marched out
into the spaces about St. Paul’s and Broadway, about the railed end
of the City Park, and also formed up along Park Row, Barclay, Warren,
and Murray Streets. The battle ground was to be the park space in
front of the City Hall. The Maxim rapid shooter was brought forward
and the men sullenly pressed up into the park, pushing the Maxim
before them, in a somewhat ludicrous confidence that its appearance
would stampede the garrison of the City Hall. Then began the firing
which the wardens had heard, as they led their prisoners up Centre
Street. They could see the stalking figures of the mob running from
point to point, and firing carefully at the chances that the windows
of the Hall afforded, where crouched the police, who responded with
easy assurance, and not without effect.
A reeling form sank constantly to the ground in many directions, and
this unfavorable balance of disaster drove Madder wild with doubt; he
knew his men would not long stand the murderous depletion. Already
the improvised auxiliaries behind the drilled men had broken and
fled, scattered over the neighboring alleys and doorways, in which
safe refuges they stared out upon the irregular frontier-like duel.
Madder’s men were taking advantage of the stone rimmed fountain
in front of the Hall, and from this screen the bullets ripped and
whistled, and often entered the windows of the Hall within whose
walls also dead and dying bodies lay.
Madder ordered the men to form and “rush” the Hall. With a yell they
sprang into the lit space on the roadway and ran forward to the steps
of the entrance. The movement had been unexpected, and the fire of
the police had for a moment dropped; this cover enabled the rioters
to reach the steps, and, for a short distance, to mount them. Then
came a sharp volley of cracking reports and every window in the Hall
was spitted with fire. The figures jumping and scrambling in a thick
mass were rolled back, and many stumbled over the fallen; cries burst
forth from the distant spectators many of whom at this juncture had
also pushed out from their hiding places and made trailing broken
lines along the far off streets. Almost at the same instant a charge
of men shot out from the doors of the Hall, and fell on the wavering
files on the steps, while from windows above and below the sharp
rattling discharges of the guns kept up.
But where the insurgents had forced themselves, the aim of the
police, guarding the windows, failed in precision and was wasted. The
shooting was wild, though men could be seen pushed far out from the
sills, trying to circumvent the misfortune of their retired position,
arising from the indentation of the walls behind the porch of the
Hall. Others had clambered to the narrow lintels of the windows on
the second story, and sent withering charges down on the men beneath
them, and more destructively enfiladed them from the wings.
The fire of the police ceased entirely as they recognized the peril
of their comrades. These men chosen from the strongest and bravest,
had actually sallied from the doors of the Hall, armed only with
clubs. They fought like demons, smashing their sticks right and left,
and devastating the throng, within whose yielding mass they soon
found themselves enclosed. It was a devoted and foolhardy risk.
With almost magical swiftness, maddened by the very sight of the
“blue-coats,” the lines behind the advance which had fallen somewhat
apart from their advanced comrades, sprang back, and in an instant
the policemen were imprisoned in the surging ball, from whose surface
rose and fell the night sticks of its desperate prisoners. Another
instant and the crowd dragging their prisoners with them broke to the
sidewalk, and then Madder’s powerful voice yelled: “Stand back and
Shoot.”
Fleeing on all sides the mob freed itself from the devoted band of
the police, and they were seen staggering and crushed together,
daunted by the sudden desertion of their enemies. Then, almost before
they realized their peril, the assassinating fire of the guns all
around them, and in the very faces of their friends, blazed upon
them, and they fell one by one, in twos and threes, while a few
dazed and exhausted tried to regain the entrance of the Hall. It
was a signal massacre. Its record was a heap of dead bodies on the
steps, and here and there a twitching figure yet unreleased from its
mortal sufferings. The windows of the Hall reddened again with the
discharges of the guns, held by its defenders, but now the rioters,
exulting over the destruction of the little group of their assailants
returned, and drove up the steps of the Hall, almost unchecked. The
gates through which the police had emerged, as they beat down upon
the mob, were yet unclosed, and they were reached by the first of the
ascending throng, before they could be shut. Quicker than thought
these men shot in upon the inner court of the Hall, in spite of
the fire directed against them from the doors and the stairways.
Physical mass asserted its mastery; those outside pressed upon those
within, and, though dying and wounded, the police could not withstand
their mere mechanical pressure. Then sounded again the terrible voice
of Madder:
“Bomb ’em, Bomb ’em.”
The cry made the stoutest heart quail, it took away the breath of the
crowd itself and the panic seized many. An interior revolt developed,
some trying to escape, others hurling themselves against them in
their efforts, while shouts, groans, a fusillade of shots, made an
indescribable confusion. The police yet held the stairway, and from
the circular gallery poured their hail of lead upon the rioters,
who returned their shots. It became a carnage and all semblance of
restraint vanished.
Those familiar with the present City Hall will recall that the
visitor enters a room-like space cut up by columns beyond, which, in
the well-like rotunda, rises the circular stairway with its narrow
marble steps and iron hand rail, its two arms sweeping right and
left from the initial landing, which is raised some ten steps from
the floor of the entrance. Above, encircling the rotunda space, and
making a fence to the circular hallway is also an iron railing. At
this fence the Mayor was standing, watching the strange and tragic
fight. Behind the stout channelled pillars of the room below, the
fighters attempted to screen themselves as the shots from above
and from the doors on either side riddled the mass and zipped
remorselessly through the chamber. The escape of those already
confined in the straitened quarters was prevented by the blockade of
those attempting to force their way in. It was at this critical and
terrible moment that Madder ordered the Bombs.
The order thus given was a cry which bore all the vocal marks of
rage and defiance; it was taken up by a hundred throats whose hoarse
and various accents of terrible execration made the next moment loom
large and hideous to all their startled hearers. It was then that
the Mayor shouted back:
“Shame! Hold back. Listen to me.”
He flung himself over the railing, wrenching himself loose from
Briggs’ restraining hand, and somehow, clambering, falling, clutching
at heads and shoulders, landed upon the small landing, raised a few
feet above the floor of the court below. His clear voice sounded—in
some stifling instant of terrified expectation—in the spaces around
with a quite superhuman loudness. The cowering figures of the
frightened ones, the motion of the mass at the doors plunging in and
out, the outside mob jostled together in a heap, bewildered by the
sweeping fire of the police, from the wings of the Hall, which had
now become withering and deadly, the rushing forms on either side
of him, as the police from above renewed a final effort to break
into the rioters and hurl them from the enclosure made before his
eyes a picture of stupefying terror. His action, by some alertness
of attention, in everyone, to the risk he ran, created a pause, an
arrest of motion, as the sudden flash of an electric spark seems to
stop the revolving wheel of light and colors.
“Why this madness! Take me if you will. Kill me if that is your wish,
but stop this insane murder!”
The protest seemed foolish; to Briggs, gritting his teeth in a spasm
of disgust, it appeared a bit of grotesque bombast. The fighting
police—for one moment as the rest—transfixed into immobility by the
suddenness of the Mayor’s motion, hardly believed their ears, and
the mob of crouching fallen and torn men gazed at the bared head
with the sharp stare of derision. The next instant the police on the
stairway seized the Mayor as he attempted to fulfill his offer, and
mix bodily with the bleeding and dying men in the lower room; but,
in some strange way, this interjection of astonishment helped the
day for the police. The bombs were not thrown; at least the attempt
came too late. By the slight coercion of some customary deferences
to command, bred in the brain molecules through years of work and
service, the rebels themselves paused in their attack, and the police
sharper in intuition and especially quickened by a superior sense
of duty saw their opportunity. From all sides from the hallways
above, they swarmed pell-mell; leaping past the Mayor they prodded
with battering instantaneity the stunned crowd. It was an avalanche,
impetuous irresistible, and, like no avalanche of dumb natural
missiles, seized its victims with discrimination and lightning speed.
The man raising the bomb was struck senseless; a dozen or more
lifted guns were knocked from the hands of their holders, hither,
thither, the baffled insurgents were driven, pinioned, beaten into
insensibility. Nor was this all. The propitious instant coincided
over a larger field of action. The police garrison in the wings of
the Hall, poured through the windows, and precipitated themselves
upon the invading ranks on the front steps of the Hall. They seemed
like a living whirlwind, from whose mad moving surfaces a thousand
arms, in simultaneous thrashing, hit right and left. The crowd
broke, men fled to this side and to that, only occasionally turning
back to fire off their yet unemptied and carelessly aimed guns. And
reinforcements came. New companies had been armed at the Police
headquarters. They strode upon the scene from Centre Street, from
Broadway, from Spruce and Nassau, encircling by anticipation the
little boiling tempest of disorder.
Then it was that Poni who had not led in the attack rushed to the
Machine Gun. Apparently it had been forgotten. It might shrewdly
have wondered why, when in the midst of wearying arms its tireless
mechanical swiftness lay unused. Gorged and yet powerless, its
volleys of leaden pellets crowding to its bore each waiting for the
click of separation to become a faintly jubilant assassin. Just let a
human hand start off its awful alacrity and, perhaps, it thought, a
different story will be told.
So too thought Poni, still cursing the bitter luck that had lost
him Jessie. In all directions the mob were now fleeing; the men
hitherto inactive that had been sent to the defence of the offices on
Broadway made themselves also into lines of marksmen, and threaded
the panic-mad multitude with killing bullets. Everywhere the sudden
collapse of the rioters seemed imminent, only the pillar of smoke and
flames, where the Municipal Building stood, yet told of their first
horrible success.
Poni approached the Maxim with the glee of desperation. He saw the
struggle yet fitfully prolonged on the steps of the Hall, and perhaps
he yet might turn the tide of battle when this belching terror began
its slaughtering work. He had looked long about the scene for the
face of Tom Ratler; he cared really little for Longtinsky’s social
revolution. His one thought had been to get away with Jessie. If
now he could meet his rival the satisfaction of killing him might
sensibly lighten the grief of losing Jessie. But nowhere in the
fighting groups, among the faces looking out from the windows of the
Hall, along the side streets—or any where, was Tom. Poni bitterly
berated his luck, that it had not allowed him the heavenly privilege
of sticking a knife into the cushion of Tom’s body, and settling one
score at least before the game was up.
And yet Tom was there all the time. After he had left the Mayor at
the Hall, Tom had run his machine into the garage on Chambers Street,
locked the doors, and actually mingled with the growing crowds which
then surrounded the Municipal Building, thinking that he might enter
and hear the results of the Trial. It did not take him long to see
that mischief was uppermost in the hustling multitude, and it was
only a few minutes later that the attack on the Building began.
Tom hastened towards the Hall thinking only of reaching the Mayor
and telling him of the conditions. These the Mayor of course knew
and Tom was told to hasten back to the garage and await there orders
from the Mayor. These orders never came; the attack on the Hall quite
displaced them, and in the fierce melee Tom and his car was quite
forgotten. Then came the dramatic intervention of the Mayor, the
sudden doubling up of the efficiency of the police, and the rapidly
accomplished discomfiture of the mob. Tom had started to reconnoitre
for himself and, in the nature of things, as Chance or Destiny
arranges the contact of opposites, he came on the scene, just in time
to meet his antagonist. He and Poni were almost alone in the empty
spaces in front of the Hall.
Scarcely had Poni placed his hand on the Maxim, than Tom, swift as
his intuition of the peril of this new ally of the rioters, had
rushed upon him. Then Poni turning _saw_ him. Tom had not been far
away, but in the night—bright as it was—and in the confusion, he
had never noted the solitary figure underneath the trees, watching
with himself the raging conflict at the doors and on the steps of
the Hall. _Then he SAW him!_ Something like a hiss escaping from his
lips, as though steam had gotten loose from too hard a confinement,
was the only note given of recognition. His hand left the machine,
and probed the breast pocket of his coat. It came out from that
ambush with a glittering knife.
“Now, by God, I’ve got ye:” the voice sounded like a continuation of
the hiss. Tom’s rush was stopped. Defence was his policy just then;
for Poni had stooped and was creeping towards him. Tom had no weapon;
the knife was a significant advantage. Poni straightened himself, Tom
saw he was gathering all his strength for a mortal dash, and he too
stood erect, with a slight wavering motion from side to side in the
interests of evasion, when the dash came.
The dash came, and Tom, with a cat’s agility leaped to one side,
but followed by Poni who too had showed an incredible flexibility.
Tom dodged, so did Poni. The two shooting figures became clear in
the lighter squares, and were partly hidden in the shadows. Poni was
breathing a little hard, Tom thought; he made the mistake of cursing
Tom too often; it was a waste of breath, and to both breath was
the subjective element of safety. Then, too, Poni’s lunges missed,
because of Tom’s quickness and coolness. But _there_ was Poni’s
implacable hatred; it fed him with a strength past comprehension.
This mutual detachment could not last long; Poni had cornered his
enemy against the railing of the park itself. The thought flashed
into Tom’s mind of butting the raging beast before him down to the
ground, and running the risk of a knife wound. The dreadful blade
flashed and turned in the light; he feared it. Again he sprang aside,
and with a yell Poni struck his shoulder, and the bitter edge entered
his flesh. It was a bad injury, but not so bad as to disable him.
The tear and smart turned him _too_ into a tiger. His hands closed
about the throat of the demon, now yelling in his ears, and they came
almost together with a hideous compression. Something cracked, two
forms rolled over on the ground.
It was a death struggle. Poni had freed himself from the clasp of
Tom’s fingers, but suffocation, or something like it, closed his
throat. And yet sense was left, and in it hate. He struck again, for
the knife had never left his hand and his blows hit. Suddenly Tom
loosened himself and KICKED. Kicking was elemental and irresistible
with Tom. It had once saved him against an infuriated stag. It saved
him now from something worse. The stout legs remembered their old
power. Poni spun like a waif from Tom’s side and—his knife flew from
his hand. Tom was weak and bleeding, but with the last gathered
effort of his will he got up and staggered over to the spot where
Poni writhed in the agonies of a broken wind-pipe—and—then the little
park grew dim, and the trees above him sped in dizzying circles.
Pictures came one by one to him. Again, as so often before, the
little room in the attic and the filled book-cases on the walls,
and then the faces of his old Mother and the kindly visage of a
rugged Father, and then—then a little farther off and smiling at him
Jessie’s sweet eyes and then—darkness.
CHAPTER XV
AN UP-TO-DATE RESCUE
Ned Link was almost sleeping—dozing certainly—in the big waiting
room of one of the Zeppelins where he had been engaged since that
astounding trip on the Fourth herein veraciously rehearsed. He was
sleepingly ruminating over the possible arrival upon his domestic
hearth of a smaller Ned Link when the door of the apartment
incontinently burst open and a frightened man stumbled into the room.
Ned recognized him as one from a near-by telegraph office; he seemed
out of breath, indeed his disorder roused Ned into a sitting posture
of attention.
“Well, old Man, what’s the row. You look as if you had heart failure.
Ennything up?”
The gasping figure caught its wind once more, and stuttered, “UP!
Well I guess Yes. Riot and Bloodshed. That’s what’s UP. You’re
wanted—or SOMEONE and quick too I can tell yer.”
Ned jumped to his feet. The man handed him a telegram. Its contents
were startling enough. It read:
“Hurry up a Balloon to the Municipal Building, Court Street, City
Hall. Rioters! Party marooned on roof. Building on FIRE. C. Q. D.”
Ned’s experience in various capacities, some of which the reader
recalls, had induced in him a preternatural composure under trying
and nerve-unsettling circumstances, but it was evident that he was
now a little disturbed.
He whistled in a tender low way that always marked a crisis in his
perplexities:
“When did this telegram come?”
“This minute, I wasn’t——”
But the sentence was not completed. Three messengers burst in at
the door, each almost speechless, and each ambitious of priority.
They showed exactly the same marconigram. Well! there must be action
somehow. Ned called up the foreman, ordered the shaft opened above
the storage stable of the huge dirigible, and after choosing three
assistants who stayed below in the coach mounted in his seat on the
pilot. It might have then been noticed by any one to whom Ned’s
previous exploits were familiar that a ladder-way of steel ropes led
from the pilot to the passenger coach. A lesson had been learned.
Slowly, with its irksome style of getting under way, as if reluctant
to break its rest with a new struggle in the wide oceans of air
to which it soared, the big Zeppelin rose between its guides, the
motor fans began their whizzing revolutions, and the four messengers
strained their necks watching its straight ascent. It was just eight
o’clock. A few minutes later the watchers relieved their necks, for
the balloon ship was swiftly gliding southward in the yet squally and
uncertain lowering night, at first a dark shadowy bolide noiselessly
veering right and left, then suddenly, as Ned turned on its light, an
aerial pyrosome flashing in the upper sky.
Ned had prepared for emergencies—he revolved the affair in his
patient mind. Some people, he thought, driven to the top of the
magnificent sky-scraper—he knew it well—couldn’t get off on any
adjoining and level surface for there were none—but how, it puzzled
him to think, had the huge place taken fire—what did it mean—rioters?
Eh,—Tom had been talking that—Sure, but then—Well, he had his job
cut out all right just now—and he knew it meant trouble—he couldn’t
settle his gas-bag down in a sheet of flame or—for that matter in
any much heated lake of air—couldn’t do it nohow—everything would
expand—and—BUST!
How was the wind?—blowing—was it blowing at all—Yes—a fairly stiff
breeze from the north-west—it was clearing—Well, he could get on
the lee side of the flames—perhaps?—he had ropes and baskets, the
men certainly could windlass ’em up—it looked that way—if—there
weren’t TOO MANY—Confound it—rather risky business—but—good pay for
the Consarn—and for himself?—well—He wasn’t saying anything—that
was a matter of duty—yes, damn it, DUTY—And yet there might be some
“dough” in it—he was not above considering life-saving a thing
of business—and—Reward—not that he wouldn’t do it without pay—of
course—NOT A SHINER—SURE!
Ha—he saw it—the smoke away down there—on the jagged sky-line.
Where was he now? About 110th street he guessed—there was the black
colossus of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine—and the pillars
in Mount Morris park—emitting the purple crown of rays that shed a
spectral splendor in the heavens and put out the stars—just there
at least to the East. YES—he was making it. Time? Gee Wizz—the
wind was just hurling him—it made him nervous about stopping—his
megaphone?—all right.
IF he could get an anchorage—his grapples were stout—chains too—he’d
swing and let down—throw out his anchors—heave over—hold fast—and
then let the men lower the baskets and get the Galoots up—some way—To
Hell with fires anyhow!—WHERE they belong too. And Ned Link snickered
at his forlorn humour.
What was this below him now—Why St. Patrick’s—Fifth and Fiftieth—he
WAS going SOME—no mistake—and now the ragged smoke line southward
smitten by the auroras of the city looked like some metallic python
unrolling its horrid gold and bronzy folds across the edges of
the houses—yes, twenty of ’em—Soon he would be there—he saw it
all—the Municipal in flames and—he thought he heard SHOOTING—lots
of it—he was sweeping then away from the Kohinoor—or, Tom’s old
roost—and below him the glitter of Union Square suddenly showed
up—Yes!—_it was_ shooting!—what in the name of Goodness was up
anyhow?—Rebellion?—why, to be sure, he had heard Tom talking
some about popular insurrection, and anarchical high-jinks—but
Pshaw!—well, it was time to be taking notice—he was getting down
town—there was a deal of bustle going on below—he now heard the guns
and cries distinctly—but—God! look there!——
And wasn’t that some one hallooing?
Ned had indeed approached the flaming, sullenly smoking Municipal
Building. For an instant he had dangerously grazed, as it were,
the invisible boisterous streams of hot air uplifted from it,
making tempestuous drifts in the upper sky and had gotten an idea
of the fierce convection of air that whirled him upwards or tossed
him around like a cork in the spiral twists of a rapid. The wind
was blowing but slightly; the night had cleared. Ned studied the
situation a few minutes; he saw that the fire was on one side of the
building and though roaring within with a stentorian hum and pushing
upwards as floor after floor dissolved away in its awful heat the
roof was yet at a considerable height above the flames. It seemed
to him possible to maneuver so that he might get close in, on the
off side—the windward side—and he swept past the building once or
twice almost on the level of its upper stories, shouting through his
megaphone to the cluster of people—he counted twelve—who had also
seen him and who called back, some of them running to and fro, a few
motionless together, and others standing apart with bowed heads.
From the moment when they were incontinently hurried to the roof, at
the instant when the attacking rioters surrounded the Building, to
the welcome sight of Ned’s aerial arrival in the monstrous air-ship,
that, in the night, afire with its lights, glided to them like some
impossible globular exhalation, Helen Lorimer and Amato had passed
through some trying hours. The unexpected events developed with
such rapidity that no one had very much considered the situation or
understood at all well just what had happened.
Flight somewhere from an unexpected danger was about the only thing
at first clearly realized. The flight had been effectively quick, and
when the elevator started to the roof it held the ten who had obeyed
the hasty summons, they consisting of the Judge, Helen, Amato, Mr.
Moser, his opponent Meldexter, a court stenographer, two reporters,
and, strangely enough, two women who had been in the court room
during the trial.
There was a whimsical element in the escape thus effected to the roof
of a sixteen story building, for, by no apparent means, could their
isolation there be relieved, and, though pretty well startled, some
were not disinclined to see the humorous side of the situation.
“We shall be above the danger—whatever it is—but shall we be any
better off there? I should prefer to be nearer the ground myself,
where my legs might be more useful. I haven’t grown wings yet,” said
Mr. Meldexter.
“Well,” said Mr. Moser, “at least we may hope to be forgotten. Out of
sight out of mind, though, your Honor, it may be yourself that will
prevent any such fortunate oblivion. If these are really desperate
rioters they won’t forget the Judge.”
That distinguished jurist failed to see the amusing side of the
predicament and yet, driven to the wall by the real or assumed
coolness of the company, grudgingly admitted a forlorn attempt at
pleasantry, in his reply. It was hardly a subject he thought for
amusement, but if it was in his power to apply “summary proceeding”
for their extrication, he would not hesitate to stretch the limits of
his prerogative in the case.
Amato was unmistakably worried, and Helen Lorimer was silent. The
reporters had learned something about the facts, and their tale, when
understood, put a very serious complexion upon the disturbance. It
was an insurrection for the release of the prisoners, and had been
well planned and was unexpectedly vigorous. After the manner of their
class they enlarged picturesquely upon the few rumors they possessed,
and were not loth to impress upon the little company around them
their own unsupported convictions that the City was in the throes of
a monstrous and quite ungovernable upheaval.
“It can not be,” it was Helen Lorimer speaking, “There is no reason
for any thing so wrong, so frightful! A few wicked spirits have
done this. They mislead and destroy their helpless dupes. Oh! how
ruthless, shameless, unfair it is!”
“It’s probably no particular care of theirs how often they try this
same hopeless cause, as long as they can get a good living, a little
useful notoriety, and an uninterrupted holiday out of it. But,
Madame, your interest in miscreants of this class hardly permits you,
it seems to me, now to find fault with them.”
It was Mr. Meldexter speaking.
“I find fault with the real offenders, Sir; my sympathy for those
unjustly accused is all the more real, because I detest their selfish
leaders.”
Then the Judge interrupted; “It won’t do just now, my friends, for
us to argue this out, or even to run the risk of disagreement in
anything. Let us keep together, bodily and mentally, and give our
undivided attention to getting out of a bad scrape. Were we not told
that a marconigram had been sent for a Zeppelin?”
“Yes; Yes,” was the reassuring answer of the elevator-man: “a balloon
has been called. It’s pretty sure to be needed. You can’t go down
now. The building’s afire.”
This forlorn state of affairs might already have been detected, for
the acrid smell of smoke came up the shaft, carried by the hurrying
currents of warm air that was filling the place, though the eating
energy of the conflagration had not yet reached the shaft.
The faces of the majority blanched, and Amato felt a strange dread.
Perhaps to all the thoughtful there, the physical factors involved in
a building sixteen stories high, with a fire at its base, suggested
how the irresistible draught and pressure would add incalculable
force to the voracious flames, and how the enormous structure might
soon become a volcano-like funnel, consuming its own walls, and
guiding its seething storms of fire to the topmost pinnacle, until it
too was overtaken and sank within, amid all the crashing floors below
it. This sea of flames beneath them was a less negotiable quantity
than the insane mob.
There was no more conversation. Some whimpers of fear started with
the two women, but they were suppressed quickly. Mr. Moser undertook
the needful task, after a moment of silence, of supplying a little
cheerfulness.
“The fire won’t reach us. Long before it has made so tiresome a
climb—remember there are some fifteen solid floors hemming it in—its
strength will be exhausted. It will burn itself out in the room it
started in. And at any rate we are sure to be taken off.”
“How do you know that?” timidly murmured one of the softly sobbing
women, whose tears felt the relief of Mr. Moser’s agreeable
encouragement.
“Know it?” said Mr. Moser with a sort of querulous and yet jocular
interrogation, as he noticed the good effect of his confidence, “Know
it? How do we know anything? The call for a Zeppelin has been sent
out. It’s inconceivable that it will not be read, and if it is—By
the way” with a sudden emphasis, “what was the call? Do you know?”
turning to the elevator-man.
“Here’s the operator. Ask him.”
The elevator which had ascended slowly was now at the end of its
trip, at the lofty wind-encircled summit. The door slid back, and
the slender company stepped hastily out into a small chamber, where
the clicks and the soft hum of a “wireless” were heard. The operator,
with clasped ears and running fingers over the board of his receiver,
was almost insensible of their entrance, at least he paid no notice,
except an instant’s glance at the faces of the group. Instinctively
they gathered about him, feeling his absolute possession of the only
means now of escape. Amato had walked out through the doorway of the
apartment upon the rather wide gallery that encompassed the building,
and leaned far over to see the conditions below them. The spectacle
was not reassuring.
Amato had slowly made his way to the north-west side of the huge
structure, and could see down into Court Street. From the south side
upon which he emerged at first, when he left the room of the wireless
operator, he beheld Chatham Street blocked with people, a surge of
heads massed into individual obliteration far south into Nassau
Street and Park Row; he discerned the incessant shifting of squads
of men immediately at the foot of the building; he had already heard
the detonations of the bombs, which broke in the doors—and, at the
moment, a tempest of cries rose weirdly to him, and there was light
enough—that supplied by the street lamps—for him to make out the
massive inrush of the rioters, as they continued to shove through the
apertures of the entrance.
Before Amato had reached his dizzy aerie of observation the first
section of the rioters had begun the work of incendiarism, careless
of all consequences. It was done, as the guards defended their
prisoners in the vaults. Oil and combustibles soon displayed their
demoniacal powers, not averse, it might seem, to have escaped
incarceration in lamps and the innocent vessels of trade, laughing
with hiss and roar, in their new orgies of disaster. Spirts of flame,
wide surfaces of tortured tongues of fire, explosions scattering
fire-brands in all directions, to become new centres for the rising
fury of heat, quickly made the great court room a furnace of death,
and expelled headlong the panic-stricken invaders.
For many minutes Amato studied the exciting scene, leaning over the
balustrade in the cool night air, centered almost 200 feet above
the tumult—and then—_he saw the flames!_ They smote against the
glass windows, and leaped through them with sharp cracks of rupture.
He could see the reflected glare of their mounting waves upon the
faces of the receding multitude—now stampeded towards the City Hall,
following a large, somewhat straggling regiment of armed men. This
was just before the assault upon the City Hall.
There was no doubt the Municipal Building was on fire. The wind had
risen, the rain was suddenly abating, the fanned furnace beneath
him would increase into a volcanic violence, and the writhing iron
supports, the columns under the rising floors, would be twisted into
cork-screws, and the building would fall! Even as he speculated upon
this—a roar reached his ears, the crash of a fallen floor whose iron
work had crumpled in the fierce heat and pulled it down, offering
another mass of fuel to the ravenous element. It seemed indeed to
Amato that the building shook, though his excited fancy might just
have erred in this. He then went on the north side, and scanned the
light aureoled city, looking down the terrific cliff of masonry to
the street. He shuddered to think of the inevitable ascent of the
fire, as it marched from story to story, and the yielding strain
of the warped and racked supports, undermining the building, which
might sink or fall. It would take time, perhaps there was not enough
material to feed the fire—the floors might hold out, and caged within
its walls the fire might quench itself for want of reinforcement.
Amato shook his head mournfully, he half believed their doom was
very near indeed! There—again—a crash, and another vibration like
a thrill of agony, in the searing column, seemed to sway his feet.
He looked long over the sheer precipice—with rope enough they might
be lowered to the street, and some one—the strongest—himself—might
be the last to slip over the parapet, and slide down from window to
window! It was an appalling risk, and his heart halted in its rapid
pulse, as he thought of Helen Lorimer entrusted to this terrifying
hazard. A queer illusion seemed to master him, and his head turned
and he supported himself for one moment groaning aloud at the awful
extremity a chance had brought them in.
Then he heard shots, many of them—like a fusillade—he thought he
heard screams, but the wind carried them away. There was no doubts
about the shots. Again the cracking reports came thinly to his ears.
He looked down again—little flames were licking, far, far, below, the
window frames, and smoke in floating curls, like eddies in a stream,
rose past him. He supposed the firemen were busy elsewhere. He could
see to the east, quivering, rising and sinking, phantoms of reflected
light, on the sky—but yet very faintly. The firemen _were_ busy.
Putkof had them engaged at the river front. And thus he watched for a
half hour or so.
Suddenly his eyes fell upon a little galaxy of light moving like
a huge _ignis fatuus_. He wondered. It grew bright. Could it be a
balloon—was it theirs—the relief balloon they had called up? Perhaps!
Watch it. It waned and waxed, now eclipsed behind a high tower and
now emerging, and always brighter. It was certainly coming towards
him, Amato thought. He traced its sinuous, up and down, right and
left course, with fascinated interest. It came on, its bulk was
visible—high up in the air; it passed over his head, shutting out the
stars like a monstrous hand. Then it whirled about and rose higher.
He shouted:
“Here we are! Here we are! Come back!”
His cry was heard in the operator’s room, and the people there led by
Miss Lorimer came out in the gallery, and joined him, some shrinking
from the gaze over the parapet that seemed just leaning against space.
“Do you see anything?” said Miss Lorimer, “the operator has just
caught a message telling him that relief has been sent to us.”
“See! Yes, indeed! Can’t you see that dancing globe above your head?”
and Amato pointed to the balloon, where Ned Link sat, looking down
too on them, as the air draughts flung him away from his destination.
For now, by some reinforcement, the fire had gained an incredible
impetus; long forks of yellow lurid flames were crowding to the
windows on the south side. The windows went in by dozens, their
splintering tinklings of broken panes lost in the succeeding roar
of the flood of fire pouring out. The floors were falling too, and
actual shudders strained the building whose very top at one moment,
to Amato, seemed to describe an arc.
And now the balloon swept round and again vanished, and again came
into view, while all the watchers called and shouted, even the judge
bawling with the rest. Helen Lorimer laughed—Oh, just a little!—the
group, screaming and gesturing, shaking out handkerchiefs, even
coats, had there, over the furnace of white heat rising to them, a
ludicrousness that, for one brief spasm of forgetfulness, amused her.
But another shock came, and another, the building rocked, the two
women gasped and swooned, the men had white faces, the Judge reeled
against the parapet. It was unmistakable, Amato watched the finial on
the apex. It described a circle, and it was a larger one than before.
He looked for the balloon. Helen was at his side; he felt her hand on
his shoulder; he pressed his own over it and whispered:
“Oh! we shall get out of this. Are you afraid?”
“Yes—I am, but not terror stricken. There is a difference.”
“I understand you—there is—but some things can’t happen! _You_ cannot
be hurt!”
He turned to her; there was a light in her eyes that shone into
his own, and his heart beat fast, a tide of blood had entered her
face and made it more beautiful. He forgot everything, the danger,
the awful crisis, the place; for an instant, that carried it in an
eternity of bliss, he felt her submission, her peace was in his
hands, and he felt it somehow wrenched from her by fear, and yet not
by any stupefaction of dread; fear, perhaps the strange solemnity of
a portentous predicament, had only broken the chrysalis of silence,
wherein—_he knew it_—lay the formed powers of her love for himself.
The shouts of those around him awoke him; he looked up. The huge
air-ship was close at hand; it passed immediately over the apex of
the building, and from it he could see the dangling ends of ropes,
and affixed to them hooked irons, like anchors. He turned to her
again, she leaned against him, the hand upon his shoulder moved
softly around his neck. He freed himself gently, and took her arms
within his hands; their faces came closer; Amato’s lips moved,
Helen’s ears caught the whisper:
“The beginning of such joy CANNOT end in death! We shall be saved!”
“Look sharp there. Catch that kedge and fix it,” the voice came from
the skies, and on the top of it came another shock or explosion or
both; the building rocked again, to some it seemed that the roof on
which they stood, wavered and reeled, from somewhere a block of stone
slid from its pediment and dropped to the street; Amato heard its
thud on the pavements. But he was only thinking of the orders from
the skies. He seized the swinging ropes. He found their ends weighted
with grappling irons, like the flukes of an anchor; he called to the
men, and Moser and Meldexter came to him from the distant end of the
gallery, and behind them the rest. There were in all five anchors;
these the men fastened as best they could, holding them in place on
the arches of the gallery and calling to Ned to pull on them. Ned
pulled and with a long snapping rip the arches gave way, splitting
the railing of the gallery, exposing lengths of it, from whose naked
edges a few shrunk away, dreading the startling depth they confronted
without the saving intervention of the fence.
The balloon drifted away and the hearts of all sank, while the two
women sobbed and shrieked. It was disconcerting. But a voice came
back, shot from the sepulchral cone of a megaphone:
“Stand to! All right, I’ll be back! Set the anchors inside the
windows.”
The thudding action of the fans were heard, and the gigantic bolide
swam upward, preparing for another descent in one magnificent sweep.
Amato took occasion to look down and measure, if he could, the extent
of the building’s dislocation. The information vouchsafed by this
inspection was terrifying enough.
He could not see the street! There was a bulge in the side of the
building—and he detected a confusion of murmurs coming up to him, as
if from the lower floors, a complication of movements, of breakages,
strains, and slow surrenders of stanchions, girders and pillars, had
set in. The roar of the flames was heard, but the wind, now losing
strength, still kept the flames and smoke driven to the south, yet
the fire was mounting—it must be—sheets of redness blazed momentarily
in the air below him accompanied by low explosions. Amato dreaded the
greater ones, those that announced some falling floor, and almost
betokened the overtaking of stored combustibles or explosives.
There!—a tremendous racking reverberation sounded below, and, after
a pause, another—and distinctly the building moved! Amato caught
hastily at a support, and terror stricken looked up again for the
balloon, while others about him breathed in sighs and gasps. The
balloon was coming in again on a long sweep, and its daring navigator
intended to bring it very near. The other men saw it; there were
eleven all told, including Amato, and the wireless operator. The
windows opening on the gallery, and fortunately at its level had been
kicked in, and they were found to be the openings to a sort of attic.
There were no lights now; the operator, when they reached him after
their flight in the elevator, had kept at his task with only an oil
lamp and a candle to help him to see.
But these were brought round from the south side, relighted in the
garret room, and while five of the men entered this chamber, the
other six awaited the descent of the balloon to catch the ropes and
anchors, pass them to the men inside, who hoped—obediently to Ned
Link’s suggestion—to find some means within of making them fast. Once
moored, the men in the balloon could draw the air-ship down, and the
embarkation of the marooned company from the roof be effected.
All stood waiting. Helen Lorimer had joined the two women, and
her composure—outwardly perfect, though her heart beat fast with
doubt—soothed and helped them. Moser, Meldexter, Amato, the two
reporters, remained on the gallery, the three other men went into
the attic, the elevator boy stood near Amato, ready to assist. The
search of the men inside the attic for means of “tieing up” was
unrewarded. The garret-like space was almost destitute of furniture,
and presented no irons, links, staples, frogs, or even girders, for
holding down the balloon with the anchors and ropes. There were
however, some long timbers, joists, or beams lying on the floor,
as if remnants of unused lumber from the first construction. The
wireless man, coming through a window again to the gallery called out
despondently:
“Nothing here but sticks of wood.”
“How long are the beams?” asked Amato.
“Oh! twelve feet perhaps.”
“Well, tie the ropes to them, put them across the windows and let
them purchase on the walls, across the opening of the windows.”
“Well said—the very thing. Look out! here she comes! Catch hold. For
God’s sake don’t lose her,” and the wireless tumbles again back into
the attic.
The balloon was over them, Ned, backing her down with great success.
The ropes were eagerly seized—and held; Amato saw Link peering from
the “pilot,” and the crew’s heads over the sides of the compartment’s
deck. As quickly as he could Moser explained the scheme of fastening
inside the garret, while the ropes and anchors were flung inside and
the ropes paid out for length. They were taken in at three windows,
two at two windows, one at the third. The tieing up inside was a
matter simply of winding them round the beams, and driving the
anchors—so well as the men could—into the wood. Link kept shouting
orders—and said—he’d break off the ends of the ropes on the balloon
when he rose, and leave the anchors in the doomed edifice—just then
he was holding everything taut.
Doomed indeed the fabric, they were on, was. Its increasing danger
was frightful; the whole stupendous mass was leaning! Its interior
had not proven fireproof in any sense. The materials of its
construction were for the most part combustible, being wood encased
in stone walls, and held up by an iron framework. Few of its floors
were of brick—it had been a flagrant example either of misconception,
or carelessness, or of some shameless corruption. Many of the rooms
were sumptuously furnished, many sealed in splendid oaken walls,
and into this labyrinth of ignitable stuffs, leagued with hundreds
of square feet of thickly painted, or oil encrusted walls, the fire
made its way with exulting ease. Nothing could withstand its horrible
violence, the immensity of its ruthless power—only its possible
suffocation in the riotous profusion of things combustible—through
lack of air to feed its own ravenous vitality. And that could not be.
The men finished their work in the attic and came out through the
windows to the group, now all gathered together watching the slowly
lowering balloon. The ropes and anchors held, and Meldexter led a
feeble cheer as the hope of escape brightened. Ned was hauling on
the cables, and so far nothing yielded; only one thing kept Amato in
suspense, the recurrent jolts of the building, as it seemed to sink
or fall together—he hardly knew which it was. With each jolt the
balloon swayed, feeling the drag on the ropes. If they only held! The
crew was cautious, Link understood the danger; all waited, and ever
and anon as Amato’s ears strained to note the reactions at work in
the building, he heard the firing of the engaged forces around the
City Hall, though he thought its early vigor had waned.
“Hold fast. Lower the crib,” it was Ned’s voice. The creak of the
windlass on the balloon’s deck ceased, and over the railing of the
compartment descended a basket large enough for one person.
“Ladies first” called Moser, as all crowded towards the welcome
vehicle of safety.
One of the two women was lifted in the basket, and it was slowly
hoisted, disappearing above their heads or just seen as a swinging
spot until it came to the balloon. The balloon was kept floating at
about fifty feet above them; Ned did not dare to approach nearer.
How long the wait seemed to Amato before the little vessel again
swung into their hands, and the second woman was launched upward to
life and the world again! It was slow business, and the explosions
increased, and the heavy structure swayed. Was there time for all?
Amato glanced about him, the light from the balloon’s lamps made it
possible for him to finally see the pale faces of the men; he saw
too that Helen Lorimer had crossed to him, and was at his side. She
had refused the first proffer of the basket, and said she would go
last. It was now her turn; a second time the basket returned, and all
held tight. Moser and Meldexter spoke together:
“Miss Lorimer, we are ready.” The smoke was coming up to them, and
even spits of fire and a shower of sparks at intervals burst around
them; these Ned feared. His voice sounded from the pilot:
“Look alive. Let the men come double.” Miss Lorimer did not stir;
But no one was kept waiting, she spoke very clearly “I will go with
Amato!”
Amato felt his heart stand still—No—Madness—She must go. He too spoke
clearly:
“Helen, for God’s sake don’t wait! We will all come. But now—delay is
fatal—take the chair.”
“Come there” it was Ned Link’s voice, “This is no time for kidding.”
Amato seized Miss Lorimer’s hand; what had occurred flashed upon
him as her Acceptance. Strange to be introduced to one’s perpetual
happiness on the edge of the chance of Death! He helped her to the
chair, and it went upward as a fresh uprush of sparks and blinding
smoke issued even from their feet. That was an awful instant, but to
Amato its terror faded and—as though he trod along some earthly vale
of flowers in the very midst of applauding friends, with his soul’s
desires satisfied—he forgot its very existence; he dreamed:
“Rudolph, I would rather wait. But I will go. Be sure to follow.”
The whisper was in his ears, as the basket rose for the third time.
No one spoke; the men were by themselves; there was a possibility of
panic; Moser felt it, so did Meldexter: they drew together, there
had been a sort of scuffle between the reporters, and the court
stenographer had showed a suspicious excitement. The Judge had
intervened in the quarrel between the reporters, and pointed out
the danger of any folly; there was but one way out of the crisis; if
they lost their heads, they lost their lives. Stilled for a moment,
the group watched for the return of the basket, and it came back
quickly. As it approached the two scufflers rushed past Amato—they
were on his side—and seized the cradle; they were white with terror,
and at its side they struck out, the taller pushing the smaller man
off, as he fought with Moser and Meldexter to keep possession of the
basket. Amato had been almost hurled from the gallery through one of
the open spaces made by the previous tearing off of the gallery wall.
His recovery was just quick enough, and the next moment, discovering
the predicament this loss of self-control placed them in, he dashed
upon the tall combatant, seized him by the coat collar, and flung him
off the cradle. He stumbled upon the smaller man, and the three fell
together in a heap upon the gallery space. Amato was on his feet in a
trice, and as the other two rose, he knocked them both flat again on
their backs. The lesson was deserved; it was remembered as well.
During this incipient brawl Moser and Meldexter got the Judge into
the chair, which again swung off, and was pulled up. After that there
were no more interruptions. Discipline did its perfect work, but
there was good reason for speed. The smoke was increasing, and the
rain of sparks, not unmixed with heavier elements, fell about them.
In the next load the two reporters and operator were placed, as the
other men feared for their collapse. It was now actually getting hot,
and Ned, watching everything, was shouting for greater haste. The
huge inflated bag veered and tossed and strained on the ropes, and
the imminent danger of its freeing itself grew more alarming. Again
the basket descended, and this time Ned ordered that two men and the
boy get in:
“Get in sitting on each others’ lap, and hold fast the guide rope;”
thundered the impatient Ned. It was done and the three arrived in
safety upon the balloon deck. Once more the cradle shot down, and
there were now only the stenographer and Amato left. They would
ascend together. When the women were sent aloft some little pains had
been taken to insure against the possibility of their falling out, by
fastening them in with binding cords, and this had consumed a little
more time than was quite consistent with the urgency of the rescue.
The men had abandoned this precaution. Amato being the larger man
told the court attendant he would seat himself in the basket first,
and then the stenographer should place himself in his lap; both were
feeling the effects of the stifling smoke now shooting up from the
crevices on the roof in spiral volleys. Suddenly as both had seemed
ready for the lift, and had shouted to the men above to draw them
up, the building lurched, its great summit slipped away from their
feet, and thus, slowly sliding over, was dragging the balloon with
it, while the basket caught at an inclined angle against the gallery
railing, was tipped, and spilled its human contents out upon the
gallery space. Amato felt the heat of the copper surface, and he
heard as well, the command shouted from the balloon:
“Let go all! Rise!”
The basket was still there and it was attached to the air-ship. As
the anchoring ropes dropped, the basket rose following the upward
surge of the balloon. There was one chance for both. The stenographer
cowered at the feet of Amato screaming in a mania of terror. Amato
seized the basket, coiled the loose suspension rope about his arm
and wrist; there was some hesitancy in the motion of the balloon;
it settled back again, and this gave time; the rattle of the ropes
as they slammed around him, thrown off from the deck, whereon all
he loved was now deserting him, aroused him to an insane strength.
He could not leave the young man; he felt his arm and wrist would
stand the tug of that suspension and lifting; could it stand a double
weight?
“Throw your arms about my neck. Now clutch hard. I’ll hold you.”
Amato caught the hanging rope above his chanceried wrist, and thus
in mid-air the two swung above the crashing mass of iron, from
whose crumbling stories rose flame and smoke, as if, with one wild
onset of demoniacal fury, the penned legions of fire intended to
break up through the very apex of the proud edifice, crowning their
destructive work with a last towering splendor of flames, that would
assault the stars. So tremendous and amazing was the spectacle that
the men on the platform of the balloon, for one inappreciable but
blood-curdling moment, forgot their work. Amato with the stenographer
on his back hung unrelieved above the maelstrom of fire. Then came
the pull. Ned was raging with oaths at their slowness. But the
men were wiser than their captain. It required an even, steady,
unaccelerated pull, to hold the strange load; Amato felt the
wrench, as his shoulder, and ligament and muscle yielded; the pain
darted through him with excruciating force; if only he could keep
consciousness! they would yet be safe and—Helen!—Helen—!!
“Good God save him! save him!” thus Helen Lorimer cried and prayed.
All were watching the appalling sight—not of the fire but this
struggle there in the air-spaces, spaces made hot with the dust of
sparks—Helen alone did not watch, but smote her breast and plead
with suffocated sobs, upon her knees, her eyes dried in the agony of
suspense, her lips scorched and pallid with a heart-tortured fear,
her body bowed in the convulsion of her supreme petition for the life
of the man she _now_ loved, with an ecstacy of pride, and homage, and
wonder, and obedience.
AND THE HEAVENS HEARD. The head of the unconscious Rudolph Amato lay
in the lap of Helen Lorimer on the floor of the soaring balloon,
pitching and rolling in the billows of the ascending heat; her hands
soothed his temples, and pressed to his lips the restoratives that
slowly brought back color to his handsome face, and awoke the smiles
of recognition in his gracious and loving eyes.
Ned had not separated his inflammable gas-bag a moment too soon. As
Amato had been drawn “aboard” belching clouds of winged sparks, like
innumerable swarms of illuminated bugs, rose about the balloon; parts
of the riggings caught afire, and were extinguished by the crew,
and a stinging smoke followed. For the tremendous ranged pile of
floors that had made up the great Municipal Building—a landmark in
the wonderful city—had begun to double up, tumbling to the ground,
ensheathed in volumes of flames and blinding fire-motes; a roar like
the faraway beating of the shores by waves proceeded from it. Its
pyramidal top, with the gallery, fenced with stone, where the rescued
group had only just been standing, had bent curiously to the south—it
was this rising of the north edge that had kept the balloon’s basket
a little longer under the control of Amato—and the bowed head of the
giant, dropped stones and disrupted ornaments from its crest upon the
smashing pavements of the square south of it, some shooting outward
to the platforms of the elevated railroad and the causeway approach
to the East River Bridge. That great conduit of travel had been
deserted; Brooklyn at the beginning of the fight had retreated, or
the home swarming multitudes turned elsewhere for a safer transit.
Still the balloon drew off, mounting higher and higher. The blazing
furnace shone like a colossal wand of light, its thunderous sounds of
combustion died away; the last noises of the combat, yet unfinished
about the City Hall, were scarcely distinguishable as Link pushed the
aerial monster on, and, as it countered the upper air-currents above
the mammoth metropolis, beaming in its nocturnal dress of electric
aureoles, no note of the warfare there reached them. But lights
along the East River side of the city showed where Putkof was busy,
and, following Miss Lorimer’s request that they should all repair to
Carrara, Link directed his aerial car towards that famous section.
Congratulations were fervent enough among the adventurers in this
strange twenty-first century rescue, and the disorders that had
threatened the safety of all were forgotten. Amato had become the
hero, and the two men who had felt the force of his fists, seemed
willing to acknowledge his merit, soothing their discomfiture with
the thought that only his presence of mind and quick action prevented
a dangerous panic. The poor stenographer hung over Amato in the cabin
of the balloon, deck, where he lay nursed by Helen Lorimer. He had
very soon recovered consciousness but movement was painful, because
of the torn ligaments of his shoulders.
The cabin of the air-ship, of that remote day, to whose triumphs over
the powers of the air, the indications of to-day so certainly point,
was a small room on the deck of the balloon’s compartment, which was
suspended from the balloon, and formed the accommodation for the
passengers. In this space fitted with divans, its windows prettily
curtained, and holding a few chairs, a table, and some convenient
mirrors, serviceable, for their own vain inspection, to the merry
companies that made such frequent use of the Zeppelins of the city,
in the pleasant days. In this room Helen Lorimer sat by the side of
Amato, and watched him with a strange pride and pleasure.
Helen Lorimer’s nature was utterly lacking in coquetry, and she
could no more have concealed her feelings, her quick interior
acknowledgement of submission to this man, who had so modestly
insisted upon recognition, and at this minute had stirred all her
feminine reverence for courage, than she could have stultified
herself at any instant in her life, by self-deception. Her frank and
almost masculine candor prevented that, and her elevation of mind and
position made the customary deceits of courtship unnecessary. She
knew that this man loved her, and she frankly conceded her acceptance
of his love at the exact moment when her own met and embraced it.
“It was an experience—something of a night-mare—” whispered Amato
from his little couch as the balloon swam into the purer air; “and
how awful it seemed to see you there, and all the possibilities—Ah—!”
the pain made him groan a little, and he relapsed into an idolatrous
gaze at the lovely woman who bent over him, adjusting with such
gentleness the cushions and the wrappings about him.
“Night-mares are temporary expedients, fortunately, for the great
purpose of letting us awake into the joy of living, and—there!—is
that more comfortable?”
Amato almost laughed; “You did not finish that almost sublime bit of
wisdom—of course you meant to say—at least I DO—living and LOVING—now
did you not?” and he caught her hand and brought it to his lips.
“Under the circumstances,” and Helen Lorimer laughed almost as
delightedly, though the color shot into her cheeks, and the faintest
surprise stole from her eyes; “some indulgence is to be expected by
you, bold Man, but you must not be as indiscreet in your thoughts
as you are in your actions”—yet she did not withdraw her hand, just
apparently leaned a little closer to him, so that its retention was
more easily secured by the irresponsible party, who even tried to
lift the hand of his lame arm to affirm its complete possession—and
which brought on a sharp twinge of agony, and a few muttered
ejaculations of disgust.
“Be careful. You may be even more useful when we reach the earth,
than you have been in the skies. A little patience and your injury
will be quite well, and then, perhaps some great risks—I feel grave
over this revolt. What madness!—that shameless Longtinsky!”
“Risks,” he smiled delightedly. “The greatest risk I could run,
_you_, have turned to success—Isn’t it so?—Helen?”
“You mean a—risk—with me? Well I cannot say—but I will be kind to you
in your helplessness just now—I may retract later—you know women have
privileges—you probably ran no risk. It was your own modesty that
made it seem one——”
She disengaged her hand, and stood up beside him—his face shadowed a
little, but the cloud passed and he almost cried out:
“If you invite me to boldness Miss Lorimer, I fear I may excel in
that—it is an easier role to play!”
“Yes?—but you remember the old adage—the adventurer who passed from
room to room and met the last door, with the inscription ‘Be not too
Bold.’”
She retreated a little, and bent towards him with her hands pressed
upon her knees and a mock dissembling frown was allowed to add its
charm to her beauty—a fact so overwhelmingly appreciated by the young
man that he groaned at his impotence and then—without any attempted
exculpation for his ingratitude—complained that his nurse neglected
his comfort, that he needed more coverings—that his shoulder should
be lifted higher, that he must sit up, that he was hungry—thirsty—in
short that nursing, considered as an art of “absent treatment” was
insufferable torture, and that Miss Lorimer MUST come nearer to him,
and minister to his immediate necessities.
But that amiable lady remained at a safe distance, assuring him
that her care for him was directed by the most approved wisdom—that
excitement was absolutely fatal to convalescence—that he as a
patient was not cold, nor hungry, nor thirsty, but—if he indeed
did wish to sit up, and would ask for assistance to that end, less
offensively she, as his constituted nurse, might be willing to
offer him the requisite help. The patient did not remonstrate at
this view of his condition, nor did he palliate the resentment of
his nurse by assenting to her pacific proposal. He simply rolled and
emitted a qualified form of howling—it might have been so called
in the parlance of Scripture—and at any rate was sufficiently and
intentionally subdued to such a point that it could not have been
audible to the company on the outside, whose sympathy was, at the
moment, curiously ignored.
The effect of this uncontrolled suffering was immediate. It brought
the apparently subservient nurse to the side of the wailing victim of
circumstances—and, that her presence there was instantly consoling
might have been inferred from the cessation of that unfortunate
being’s distress—and, through some less conceivable reason than
trained service as a nurse, it brought about a train of results not
assumed necessary in ordinary hospital practice. As the young woman
leaned over her subject his healthy arm became engaged somewhere
in the vicinity of her neck—there was room for some confusion
of mind in this operation as she appeared to assist him in the
process—and then succeeded a slight cervical intermixture—_so to
speak_—it almost seemed as if the nurse lifted him into an upright
position, but there was a slight relaxation, and the patient
was finally left conveniently propped up on cushions, with a
singularly animated expression of complete relief, on his face,
while the nurse—recognizing the urgency of the situation—sat near
him with an appropriately pleased manner and some unmistakably—and
improving—flushes of color upon her cheeks.
The company leaning on the taffrail of the compartment deck of the
balloon, wondering at the marvellous prospect of the outspread city,
thrilled with a delight that kept them silent over their wonderful
escape, scarcely noticed the absence of Amato and Helen Lorimer,
having perhaps some correct intuitions as to their mutual happiness.
Onward in the illimitable lake of air the huge aerial leviathan made
its way; the city below it was indistinguishable now in its details
and became a punctured surface wherein dots of light ran into streams
of sinuous gleamings while ever and anon a spoke of light emitted
by some tremendous electric arc, shot up like a veritable pillar.
The city was delimited by the vaporous splendor of the overspreading
aurora of light, that strange wonder that had awakened Tom Ratler’s
first amazement, and far away over Long Island the reverberations of
light shimmered on the skies.
“Rather a narrow escape, your Honor,” said Meldexter, “I wonder what
became of the Jury—and the Case?”
The Judge laughed. “Yes, it is a trying predicament as a legal
precedent—a Jury liberated perhaps from mortal confinement by the
victims of its own deliberations could hardly be trusted if their
convictions were against the prisoners; they would be less or more
than human if they did not give them the benefit of a change of mind,
after they got out. There was probably no verdict reached and the
Case is—as if—it had not been.”
“Of course the Jury must have escaped,” said Mr. Moser “Perhaps—the
prisoners too.”
“The Case has undergone some enlargement since the morning,” it was
one of the reporters who was speaking, “any guilt on the part of
Longtinsky, Polinck & Co., has evolved into a tragic immensity that
means treason to the State.”
“LOOK, LOOK!” the cry came from the opposite side of the deck. The
men hurried round to the place whence the call had been heard, and
there were the two women, the stenographer, the wireless operator,
with the men of the balloon’s crew, pointing below them to a
conflagration which flickered and smoked, rose and fell. The balloon
had been rapidly falling. Ned Link intended to land somewhere in the
flat space near the intersection of the present Speed way, Dyckman
Street, and the Kingsbridge road. The anchors were no longer on
board, and his descent was made more precarious, and necessitated a
drop upon some even ground. This space was convenient, having been
made into a grass land, holding lawn tennis courts, and croquet
fields. But as he drove downward at 190th street, what was his
astonishment when he saw that the region was swarming with men, and
that the torch of the incendiary had fired the buildings of the
public park upon the summit of St. George.
It was this spectacle that startled the sightseers on the balloon.
But the balloon itself had not escaped detection from the earth,
and as it approached, a sizzling bomb shot up towards it to explode
harmlessly some hundred feet below it. The warning was however heeded
and again Ned raised his apparatus, and soared in circles like a
watching dragon, confusing and alarming his assailants beneath; they
evidently feared his maneuvers, for now a sudden volley of missiles
ascended, being for the most part pyrotechnical demonstrations, in
the shape of sky-rockets. The little party of aeronauts were visibly
impressed. It certainly resembled—this hostile gathering, there in
the northern section of the city—some prearranged movement, and might
as well as not have a direct connection with the outbreak at the City
Hall.
The balloon whirled upward again and Ned examined the conditions
around the opposite hill of Carrara. Here all saw lights moving
fitfully; confused murmurs reached them, and a sense of some sort
of trepidation in the inmates of the tiered palaces came to them.
Helen Lorimer had left for an instant her charge, after a confirmed
assurance from him that he was altogether comfortable—at least for a
few minutes, though his condition might, after the expiration of a
short interval, assume desperate extremes—and was gazing too, with
the rest, at the alarming symptoms of disorder in the city, with the
Carrara homes as the immediate object of its attack.
The suddenness of the assault upon the Municipal Building had been
astonishing, and its success unexpected; it was evident that the
City was unguarded. Moser and Meldexter both recalled the fact of
the absence of the Militia; the fighting around the City Hall showed
the perilous state of affairs, and now they realized that, more
significantly yet, a dangerous attempt to ruin the famous Carrara
Ridge was in progress.
The more it was thought over the clearer it became; the city was in
the throes of a convulsion. Helen Lorimer was agonized at the thought
of the danger to her Mother, and of her home. What was to be done?
She turned a questioning glance up to Ned Link in the pilot above
her, and he saw her wistful face, pale and anxious in the light of
the lamps, which had been again reillumined, after a short eclipse,
when in the neighborhood of the skyrocketing rioters at St. George’s.
“Well!” he answered exactly her mute interrogation, “we’ll sail
down the Kingsbridge road a way, and I’ll let you out near Depot
Lane—_perhaps_, if you care to chance it—you can get to the Carrara
by the back way along the Lafayette Boulevard. I don’t think it’s
very safe. I might get you somewhere else further away, but the ship
has got to light soon; there’s something wrong—she’s scorched a hole
or something—Hello—they’re off—” and he pointed to the east.
On the hillside where the broad street sweeps now from the brewery
at Fort Mendel, to the Inwood valley, a moving train of lights
was observed. There were not many and they came and went as if
extinguished and again relighted, but they allowed the watchers dimly
to discern descending a mass which could only be interpreted as the
invading army of the mob. It was indeed Bomber’s force, timing his
attack with the assault upon the City Hall. He was a little late; the
fight in the City Hall was then waning with the rioters discomfited.
Almost as the same instant red globes of fire ascended from the
ridge in Carrara, like a silent yet luminous challenge—but that
was not their meaning—they were the signals of distress, they were
meant to call assistance. The party on the balloon understood them
also; all there was again uncertainty and irresolution. Ned followed
his own head. He determined to alight near Depot Lane and let them
out; the balloon was becoming unmanageable. Suddenly it lurched and
slipped through the air sideways, pitching the groups and the crew
almost off their feet and righting again with a shock that knocked
Amato from his cushions. Helen was at his side—how it delighted him
to notice her alacrity—and as she helped him tenderly to regain his
position, she told him of the discovery that an attack was about to
take place at Carrara. It furnished him some food for thought.
Link kept driving the balloon, shouting to the crew to shift ballast
from time to time, and telling all to make ready to “GET OUT.” When
the critical state of the region was first noticed, the Judge and
the lawyers thought it would be best to go elsewhere, fearing the
danger of alighting in the midst of the social hornet’s-nest, which
was buzzing so obstreperously. But this council was intolerable to
Helen Lorimer, and to Amato as well—injured though he was. Argument
had progressed somewhat on these points when Ned Link finished all
indecision by assuring them he must descend; he thought he could
“fetch ’em a little east of the Arrowhead inn”. Thither their course
was now directed. But they never reached it. The balloon either
exhausted by its strenuous experiences, and perhaps, too, somewhat
overcome and distrait with the reckless and unusual proceedings in
the great city, even it may be surmised, suffering from a distracted
sense of responsibility with its official and distinguished
burden—or, it may be from some more prosaic cause, as a _hole_ in its
sides, began visibly to fall, still however sliding forward at lower
and lower levels. Ned saw its inevitable collapse, and fearing to
come down obliquely on the roof tops attempted to steer it into the
highway of the Kingsbridge Boulevard. With his fans alternately set
forward or reversed he managed to keep it, though rolling, (which
motion played havoc with the gravity of its occupants and forced
Helen to remain close to her charge assisted by Mr. Moser, the latter
to Amato’s personal weariness) in the roadway, when seized by some
last whim of desperation it rose, swerved, and—so to speak—dashed
its brains out against a chance stone structure, whose convenient
eminence caught its fancy, and went to pieces.
A violent surge upward, a tilt that sent men and women sprawling,
mingled with the irresolute and shifting furniture of the deck, a
terrific bump, magnified, past all conception, beyond ordinary bumps,
and then tearings, crashings, splinterings, and cries. That was the
end of it. The contributions of cries came more from the streets than
from the balloon. The streets were full of people: commotion and
excitement reigned everywhere, and this new portent dropping from the
air gave an additional and pleasurable impetus to the emotions of the
miscellaneous crowds; another consternation for their jumping nerves.
Ned had leaped from the pilot, getting down to the compartment by a
rope ladder, and ordered everyone to retire to the cabin. It was more
stoutly made than the deck, and the balloon pitching heavily would
probably split, and the extensions of the deck would act as guards.
He had turned off all the power, put out the lights, and shot a hole
in the gas-bag. Then he let things take their course, prepared for
the last bump, and hoped to escape injury in the enclosed cabin.
The bump came, and with it a long hoarse wail, beginning with a queer
murmurous hiss, and rising past the wail to a stertorous scream; it
was the escaping gas, and the ripping sides of the gas-vault. The
balloon shrank into a depleted cavernous bunch of waste, and this
abrupt disappearance of the last remnant of buoyancy saved them all.
They were all about flat on their backs, and the thud came just and
disarranged them a little more, and really no one the worse for it.
And after the thud came stagnation, and silence. It was again a
humorous situation, and both Helen and Amato thought so.
Not a sound had been uttered, even the two despairing women and
the two belligerent reporters had been shocked into voiceless
consternation. The distinguished Judge and the celebrated solicitors,
the famous Helen Lorimer, reduced by danger—as she herself felt—to
the ignominious level of clutching a more or less perpendicular
floor, and waiting for eventualities, had certainly a comic interest.
And when they at last settled down with the last jounce and no one
seemed hurt, though, by reason of the mechanics of an inclined plane,
they suffered from a little heterogeneous mixture, and Amato was in
greater pain, both these happy souls laughed. In the darkness that
laugh restored confidence and it was followed by Helen Lorimer’s
voice:
“Well we can be quite sure that we have arrived; that was an
unmistakable thump, but doesn’t it feel good to be here? Mother Earth
has an unforgettable reality about her. Mr. Link, we owe our lives to
you, and now if we can get out into the streets, and see about us,
all will be right with us I know. As a sky-pilot, Mr. Link, you are
a better success than many who boast of their prerogatives in that
respect.”
This alertness and cheerfulness put all in good humor, and relieved
the anxiety. There was really not much reason for alarm; the
underpinning of the deck had been crushed out of all recognition,
but its crumpling up had made the impact of the compartment less
severe, and with the exception of the few bruises caught in their
miscellaneous contact with the walls of the cabin, and with each
other, the party was altogether unhurt.
They found themselves at last on the earth again and proceeded with
all possible haste to extricate themselves from the wreck. Willing
and numerous hands helped them; they had fallen at about the junction
of the old Kingsbridge road and Amsterdam Avenue. They were not so
far away from Carrara. After they had “found themselves,” so to
speak, Ned Link telephoned for the wrecking forces of the Zeppelin
to which he belonged, to clear the wreckage; Mr. Moser offered his
assistance to Amato and Miss Lorimer; the Judge, the two reporters,
the two women, the stenographer, the wireless operator, and the
elevator boy scattered, with more or less haste, to their several
homes, after hurried congratulations. Moser, Helen, Amato repaired
to a druggist’s where Amato was made more comfortable, and then Mr.
Moser looked about for an auto to convey them to Miss Lorimer’s home.
Already that home and its bordering habitations were beleaguered by
the storming rioters, led by Bomber.
CHAPTER XVI
THE MAYOR’S DEATH
When the Mayor ordered out the 69th and 22d regiments, the sole
remnants of the large militia forces of the city, he enjoined their
commands to protect the properties at Carrara. At the same time,
even as his messages flew to their destinations, Bomber was awaiting
the influx of the men intended to effect its destruction. He had
made his headquarters in the Park on St. George’s Hill, and he was
not disappointed in the rapid concentration of an armed multitude.
They came from the east, approaching their improvised _rendez-vous_
over the Washington Bridge, and some moved southward from the north,
reaching their position, over the hills of Fordham by the Mosholu
Driveway, tramping in files or companies, all the way from the low
lands of West Farms. The riot at the Municipal Building and the City
Hall began at night-fall—about six o’clock,—and had been thwarted and
defeated somewhere between nine and ten. The refugees whose perils we
have recounted, had escaped to the roof of the Municipal Building at
six, had been taken off about eight-thirty, and had returned to the
north-central part of the city where this story has just left them,
seeking safety and refuge at—it may be stated—nine, for the dial
of the clock has some reference to the remaining incidents of this
narrative.
The Mayor, after the repulse of the mob, had sent in a call for the
ambulances, and essayed himself to help the wounded on both sides.
It was a sorrowful and bitter sight. This, he thought, had at last
been the outcome of the years of increasing class hatred. His heart
bled for it; the fame of the noble city vanished, grown so beautiful
and crowded too with manifold means of mercy! Was it just; was it
right; was he to blame! The accusation smote him with an insufferable
agony. He had worked hard to heal these social wounds, and the pride,
the joy, alleviating his forlorn sense of desertion, had been an
exulting realization that he had done so in these last months of
tireless effort. And now—this pitiful cheerless tragic sequel! Tears
started to his eyes, and sobs almost broke from his lips. He had
loved New York so well and all its people. Was everything he loved
to disappoint him?—and then the thought of the endangered Carrara
flashed through his mind. He stood up, rising from the task of
helping a poor wretch into an ambulance, with the young doctor that
accompanied it, and saw his secretary Mr. Briggs following him.
He turned towards him almost with a motion of anger; this man had
perhaps steeled his heart, blinded his sympathies, made him ruthless
in the use of power! He knew his worth but it was a worth caked into
a rigidity of cruel formalism by the prejudices of industrial needs,
the set phrases of an apprehensive Capitalism. Personally he—the
Mayor—had no faith, as faiths are counted, but he worshipped the
ideal of a social Brotherhood—whatever that might be called. Perhaps
he had allowed this man to obliterate this picture too easily with
his incessant lectures, his frigidism, his secularity. He let his
resentment flame out:
“Perhaps this Sir is your work—this slaughter—this fratricide. This
is the outcome of the discord you love to foment. Do you like it?”
He advanced towards him almost with a menace in his voice and action.
Mr. Briggs stopped suddenly and looked at the Mayor, just long enough
to let the shadow of something like contemptuous pity steal into his
eyes and then quietly answered:
“No Sir, it is not my work—nor YOURS; I have just put Tom Ratler in
an ambulance and sent him to the hospital. I found him unconscious
lying over there against the railing of the park.”
The Mayor was sincerely fond of Tom, and this information startled
him out of all his brooding misgivings; over the field the doctors
and nurses were working, lamps moved from place to place, groans
too issued from many quarters; the police from the Hall covered the
ground, and the outskirts of the park swarmed with crowds as the
police pushed backward the sullen or the indifferent or the curious.
The rioters had apparently vanished. Briggs told the Mayor he had
sent to the same hospital and in the same ambulance Tom’s bitter
enemy, Poniatowsky and with them had gone Jessie Longtinsky, though
he added:
“Her predicament is painful, they are both her lovers; she fears one
and loves the other; I need not say which is which,” and the speaker
looked oddly at the Mayor and smiled.
“How did it happen; was Tom in the fight?” asked the Mayor.
“Well, I think he _was_, and he was fighting his dearest foe—that
Poniatowsky—they are both near the end of things.”
Pain came into the Mayor’s face, and some reminiscent revery held
him for an instant. He looked over the workers gradually finishing
the gruesome duty of getting the dead together, and despatching the
wounded away to the hospitals. He turned again to Mr. Briggs:
“See that every one here—striker—” the word brought a sigh from his
lips—were these the men he had repulsed?—“Ah—rioter and policeman
alike are attended to. I shall take the machine and go north—to
Carrara—”
Mr. Briggs was inclined to resist this determination at first, but he
understood the Mayor’s feelings too well, and he really feared his
outbursts if he provoked them; they could be unpleasantly vindictive
and ugly; he would let nothing separate him from the Mayor. The man
had been his best friend and he almost adored certain qualities in
the Mayor, though he cherished a contempt for his dreams of social
rehabilitation.
“Everything shall be attended to as you wish. But Sir if I might be
permitted to offer one word of advice; it seems to me——”
“Not another word Briggs; the worst outbreak will be at Carrara—I
know it. The very sight of those white palaces will make the blood
boil in the veins of these unhappy, these misguided men. They will
feel there as if they were about to throttle their enemy, kill him in
his lair. If I can I will prevent it—whatever happens——”
He waved his hand and walked rapidly away; Briggs watched his
disappearing form sadly. He was not a man of psychic sensibility but
somehow he felt that a gulf of final separation was opening between
him and the Mayor, and in that gulf lay the prostrate body of his
master. A few moments later the Mayor shot from the City Hall park
moving through a lane made for him by the police. His vehicle passed
up Broadway which was streaming with crowds, restlessly surging
towards and from the City Hall. Except for the trolley cars that
occupied it, as they do to-day, there were no other carriages than
the Mayor’s and it swiftly sped on its way.
A few recognized the Mayor’s automobile, and a shout or some hurled
defiance, a cheer, a query, or simply the amazed gaze of the
spectators greeted him. The Mayor was buried in his own excited
thoughts. He felt the critical terror of this day, and he revolted
with his whole soul against the needlessness, the awful consequences
of it. It was not simply the pain of sympathy and bereavement, but
the more disturbing dread of a disordered state, with civil unrest
and embittered irreconcilable social elements, whose enmities would
corrode the foundations of government and infiltrate all the veins
and circulations of political life.
Sunk in the pillows of the Limousine he pondered over the action he
should now take. He was not unacquainted with previous threats made
against Carrara and he understood the hideous rage of the Longtinsky
people. That man’s hatred of Helen Lorimer possessed him like a
consuming fever. And now her home was to be destroyed, if it were
possible, and she—his heart almost stopped at the thought—herself
was in danger. And while the Mayor glided northward on the spinning
wheels of his noiseless carriage, at intervals bruising the silence
with its clamorous honk, and always sweeping the ground before it
with two broad brushes of light; while Helen Lorimer and Amato and
Mr. Moser were searching for a conveyance to the same destination as
the Mayor’s; while the militiamen were hurrying to their armories
expecting a sanguinary struggle at the same point, Bomber had
anticipated these contrasted forces of opposition, and—though much
later than he hoped—had moved down the Dyckman road and already was
filing in three columns through Nagle, Sherman and Post Avenues to
the marble terraces of Carrara, aiming especially to capture the home
and mistress of the Lorimer villa.
Bomber was a man after Longtinsky’s own heart, and he had moulded
him to his purposes, inflaming a bitter and criminal nature with
the promise of gain, and filling his ears and mind with the murmurs
of envy. An inordinate conceit, a feeling of injury, that he was
the victim of a false social system, and a heart grown ruthless
from brooding over imaginary wrongs, made him a fit instrument to
accomplish Longtinsky’s designs. Bomber was the child of an Irish
mother and an American father, and he inherited the verbal fluency
of the first, with the undaunted self-confidence of the latter, and
he had wandered far from the moral fortitude of both. His vanity,
and the smoothness of his tongue had hurried him into foolish
enterprises, and credulity and lack of discretion had invariably
brought about his ruin. These disappointments had vexed his
self-esteem and soured him. He had not been saved the consequences of
an admired physical charm, and indulgences had perverted still more
the easy rules of his life. Yet the strangest circumstance of this
man’s life remains untold. HE TOO LOVED HELEN LORIMER.
At the death of his parents, Bomber inherited enough money to be able
to live much as he wished. He had received a fairly good education,
an education which might have been improved, if he had himself helped
more the opportunities accompanying it. The city’s pleasures he
understood, and his skill in talking, his dalliance with the brighter
novelties of living, had given him a sort of vogue in a fast set of
young men, among whom, occasionally, he met some belonging to the
acquaintances of the beautiful Helen Lorimer. This was of course
some years before. Bomber had often seen the famous lady at public
places of entertainment, the theatres, the opera, at concerts—Bomber
had some skill himself in playing, and much musical taste—and he had
actually spoken with her at her Settlement House, when he endeavored
to put himself in as good a light as possible, and thought that he
had succeeded. Contact with women had bred in him an infatuation, a
very great sense of his conquering personal charm. He felt pretty
sure that Helen Lorimer must have noted it too. At the time he stood
well, and the sharp reverses that later left him penniless had not
yet developed. He had just then no use for socialism and rather
sported his aristocratic prejudices.
He undertook to give the “young Portia of the city,” as he called
Miss Lorimer, advice in some well written letters, upon her various
projects, and assiduously set himself about getting into her graces
by an apparent interest in the poor—an hypocritical affectation
then. The letters had been answered by Miss Lorimer’s secretary
and a little curtly. Then he made a mistake, a most ill-considered
blunder. He told her in a letter, full of ridiculous tropes and
foolish imagery—a letter such as self-deluded men often write when
fate drives them to their ruin—that he loved her. The letter reached
Helen Lorimer. She blushed, laughed and carefully burned it up.
Bomber waited for an answer. So intolerable was his conceit that he
really deceived himself into believing that Miss Lorimer’s silence
was to be interpreted as a favorable sign of her favor, and—making
“his will lord of his reason”—wrote her another fatuous epistle. This
letter Miss Lorimer did not see; it fell into the hands of her uncle,
who, opening it by a mistake and catching its contents fell into a
tremendous rage, and in an answer told the incorrigible Bomber that
he was a jackass, that his effrontery deserved public exposure, that
Miss Lorimer was insulted by any association with his name.
Bomber writhed under this repulse, and then his fortune failed, his
plans went all wrong, his money vanished, the better sort of his
companions deserted him, and he fell from round to round in the
scale of decency, and he turned with an almost impious hatred upon
all he had once admired. Bitten by jealousy, his heart poisoned by
failure, his stupid pride affronted, almost to others a spectacle of
indigence, the ulcer of discontent wore into his soul and he handed
himself over to the forces of annihilation. He made a living by
conceiving vitriolic attacks upon property, upon reputations, and he
avenged himself for his repulse by insinuations, false, cruel and
repulsive, on the fair name of Helen Lorimer.
The man became furiously bestial. His strength, his youth,
carried him through trials of dissipation, that less stalwart or
inured natures would have crumbled or decayed under. The fever
of denunciation grew on him; Longtinsky’s plan, mad, impossible,
delirious, suited him precisely. He rushed into it and helped its
author to more completely arrange and perfect its details. He shared
with Longtinsky the overmastering control of the whole impudent
and hopeless scheme. But it was the chance to him for revenge! His
impatience overcame every scruple, and he revelled in the dream of
destroying the homes of Carrara, the villa of the Lorimers—even, in
some more atrocious moments of desire of capturing, enslaving the
queen of that proud society!
Thus, when Bomber led his little army to destruction, he found
himself where at last he might work out his long cherished hopes. And
it was a strange fact that in the notable uprising of this distant
day, the leaders were entirely selfish—most of them—while the devoted
believers in some sort of social upheaval, the men who formed the
rank and file of the movement, were more moved by ideas of justice,
and of readjustment, in which their rights would be restored and
their ills righted.
The shuffling lines of men came down the long hill of Fort George,
they turned from Dyckman Street into the three avenues which lead
southwesterly to the Kingsbridge Road. There was no uniform among
them; here and there a red ribbon, and an occasional show of brass
buttons in some frayed coat, hardly helped the physical homogeneity
of about twelve hundred men of all sizes and service. Bomber had been
disappointed at the numbers of his army, and he had a discouraged
feeling about their enthusiasm. They were the enrolled members of
an anarchistic society, and probably would fight well if it came to
fighting. Longtinsky had once insisted that with any show of force,
the Mayor would compromise—and then, on some favorable terms perhaps,
they would gain power and there would be an UPRISING.
It all seemed simple enough, planned in a guarded room. Out in the
open, beneath the stars the conquest of the city was more a matter of
daring than words. So Bomber thought. Yet his hopes blinded him to
fear. He did not expect any difficulties at Carrara. The place should
be destroyed. He almost laughed to think of it. The police would be
kept busy at the City Hall. Perhaps Helen Lorimer would have a little
more respect for him after that!—suppose he took her a prisoner—an
hostage of that sort, might make the stubborn necks and the dull
heads of the Plum-Puddings bend, and think just a little. Indeed he
was not averse to dwell upon the favorable chance of a conversation
with Miss Lorimer and the diabolical fancy entered his mind of making
some matrimonial agreement with her. So banal and ludicrous is a
depraved vanity!
Bomber’s tall frame had been moving among the men, as they slowly
assembled, painting in glowing colors the ease of their work,
and just what it was. They would be almost unopposed. Scouts had
brought in the news that Carrara was being deserted; whether the
Lorimer villa was empty was uncertain; lights were burning there,
and figures had been seen moving in the chambers. But that was of
no consequence—only some frightened women! Bomber naturally thought
that Miss Lorimer had returned home from the trial, which, it was
universally known, she had most punctually attended each day. He did
not know of the conflagration and disaster at the Municipal Building.
He told his gloating hearers that the Revolution had been started
at the City Hall—Putkof had set the shipping afire throughout
the East Side—all the prisoners would be liberated, the city was
panic-stricken—nerveless; the militia away—no regular troop anywhere
around—the garrisons at the forts, at the Narrows sent away, and
those at Throg’s Neck as well. They would win on their own terms.
This was their chance to wipe out Carrara—the luxurious homes of
their masters, the tyrants of wealth, the sleek vainglorious idlers
who fattened on the sweat and earnings and skill and daily risks of
the workers.
So he walked and so he talked—yet he had misgivings. One thing was
annoying; his guns, his ammunition, had not arrived. They were
concealed in an empty house at High Bridge, and the wagons drawing
them with muffled wheels had not appeared. Only a few of those that
pushed their way into the entrance of the park carried arms. However,
he had no doubt that the guns would come—it made things late—though,
and time counted for something. But a hollowness in the whole effort
suddenly struck him; for one instant the great reserves of defence
in the mammoth city were indeed abroad, but how long would it take
for the four quarters of the country to pour in their support—how
long before these reserves themselves would be storming his little
host with all the implements of death? Unless—Ah, he pinned some hope
on that—unless as Longtinsky told him, the Time EVERYWHERE was ripe
for Revolution. He half believed it. The thought gave him nerve and
confidence.
The attacks of the rioters at the City Hall, and on the East Side,
had summoned all the police to the southern districts of the city,
and Bomber, acquainted with the fact of the presence of the members
of the 22d and 69th regiments in the city, was convinced that they
would not be able to interfere with him. The Mayor’s warning and his
own fears as well were destined to frustrate these hopes.
Still no supplies. Bomber chafed and raged—already more than an
hour had been lost. He was general enough to realize the importance
of promptness. Messenger after messenger had been despatched to
High Bridge, and none had returned. Bomber was in a group of
his lieutenants at the brow of the hill overlooking the Inwood
depression, and the viaduct, to Kingsbridge, of the present subway.
His first move had been to interrupt the trains of the Subway, and a
detachment of his men had pushed their way up to the Dyckman Street
station, and into the opening of the long tunnel leading south to
155th street—but no trains were running, the company deeming it
too dangerous for one thing, and because orders from the armories
requisitioned them for the service of the troops.
Still Bomber’s men tore up the free rails of the tracks, for a short
distance.
“What in thunder holds those men—Here—” to a dozen staring
auditors who happened to carry guns on their shoulders, “Get down
to High Bridge, a pack of you—Perhaps help is needed—Wait—” the
men turned—“Let more of you go. There is a kit of tools up on the
balcony—” pointing to the pleasure house raised in soaring terraces
at the highest point of the park—“a few crowbars may help you—and for
that matter a bomb or so—” he added savagely, for it was Bomber who
gave these orders.
“Perhaps they can’t get at the guns and ammunition. Hammer everything
to Hell, and bring them up;” then turning aside to a man who
stood apart, watching the fitful signs of agitation across the
valley, on the Carrara Hills—“We’re running our heads into a noose
perhaps—Eh—but if we stand here and wait for sunrise it will be cold
bullets!—”
The man did not stir; the whispered fear did not seem to interest
him, it certainly failed to withdraw his scrutiny from the pale
white palaces, now growing more and more indistinct, as the lights
went out, or again illumined in a spectral glare as some white flash
flared in the courtyards, or the gleam of a descending rocket shone
on them. At length the man dropped his glass, and showed he was
not unconscious of the speaker—but he only muttered—almost as to
himself—pointing with his disengaged hand to the opposite rim of land.
“Win that and if the worst comes—there are ways out—Money provides.”
Bomber seized his arm, drew him around to face himself, and then
dropped his hands on the man’s shoulders and brought his face close
to his:
“Yes, I know it does—but will a few empty houses furnish it? Do you
know anything?”
“Know,” said the other returning the gaze fearlessly, and just
perceptibly shrinking backward, as if finding this menacing scrutiny
repugnant;—“I know that those money-bags have been storing coins and
greenbacks in their safes for months. They expected this—some of
them. Sly foxes, they knew the cry of the hounds long before they saw
their teeth—they’re ready to give us the slip—Trap ’em and you are
made. They’ve sold stocks, bonds everything and were getting their
plunder together to slip over to Canada, make a dash for Europe,
Mexico, anywhere—They’re too late. Bomber, if our hands close on that
treasure we can take the same trip. Canada or any place might be a
happier home for us than this city.”
Bomber looked nervously around. No one stood very close to them—the
occasional rockets rising languidly from point to point in Carrara
intimating some telegraphy between the houses, as if preparations or
alarm were keeping their occupants busy, had attracted every eye.
Bomber pulled his friend farther away from any chance interruption;
his voice sank to a whisper, and his mouth sought his companion’s ear:
“I’ve been thinking of the same thing—But can we do it?”
“Do it—I can. You know me, a bank-cracksman for years. I’ve not
learned my trade for nothing. Get me in those houses yonder and I’ll
find the bottoms of their long purses. Trust me.”
A cry startled them. They looked behind them, and they saw the flames
shooting upward in the park—The pleasure house was burning—It was
this blaze, then culminating into a vast pyre, that the frightened
travellers in the balloon saw a half hour or so later.
It caused almost as much consternation to Bomber and his advisers.
Their force was revealed—the increasing light brought out with
terrible distinctness the formless straggling groups—their
position—and in its discovering brilliancy, illumined the long slant
hill, on which a few companies of men were moving. It conveyed a
further terror to Carrara—the rockets ascended in sudden flight from
new points. Evidently it was interpreted as a signal for the opening
of the anticipated attack.
Bomber was quick to act on his part. He left the man whose sordid
selfishness and cynical opportunism were already shared by himself,
and ordering his subalterns to rush through the crowds, commanded
them to hurry down to the hillside and screen themselves in the
oblique avenues below—Nagle, Sherman, and Post Avenues—somewhat
further away from this unfavorable exposure.
The conflagration had been started by the men whom Bomber had
despatched to High Bridge. In rummaging about for the crowbars and
picks, as weapons of assault on the closed doors that perhaps yet
foiled the rioters’ plans they had upset an oil lamp, whose trailing
fringes of flame had ignited the woodwork of the well dried and
combustible pleasure house, and, as if responsive to the growing
alarm of the great city, that frail fabric burst into a sheet of
swerving and dazzling light. The men in companies and scattered
arrangements of files and groups ran down the hill, and it was a few
last individuals that Helen Lorimer and Amato saw as they passed
overhead later. The floating habitation caused a little consternation
to the men yet unequipped for the attack upon Carrara, and Bomber
watched it with misgivings, while to the anxious sentinels—both men
and women—on Carrara, it was hailed as an omen of rescue.
In Carrara, to which place we must now direct our inspection, all
was in confusion, and in the dismay, increased every moment by
new disquieting news brought in by scouts, or received over the
telephone and by messengers, mingled the baleful prognostications of
some special upheaval, and the long dreaded and often forewarned
condition of affairs in the city was soon understood, though all the
happenings at the City Hall were not reported, and when it became
apparent that an attack was to be made upon Carrara itself, the
householders hurried together and council was taken as to what was to
be done.
Some argued for instant evacuation, others believed that an
armed resistance was possible, but that bold decision was coolly
shown to be impossible, unless the united men—proprietors and
servants—garrisoned some one of the stronger houses and deserted
the rest. Julieta Lorimer was in despair over the continued absence
of her daughter, and no information could be secured from the
offices down town while the few who in some way had heard of the
incarceration of the inmates in the Municipal Building, and among
them Helen Lorimer, and its consequent burning, none dared to tell
the awful tale.
Perhaps in all three hundred men could be mustered, and these poorly
supplied with arms, and resistance seemed hopeless with this number
against the overwhelming odds. There had not been much time for
deliberation, but such time as was allowed was well employed. Very
helpful to the householders was the path of communication between
the villas. It ran along the crest of the ridge irregularly set with
alcoves, stone benches, and ascending and descending steps that gave
it a most pleasing variety. Over this, that evening, the neighbors
passed and their hurried conference was made at the home of Helen
Lorimer. Hither came the family heads, young and less prudent younger
members, and gathering with them a squad of the male dependents who
were not all disposed to encourage a resistance to the approaching
invasion.
The impending danger hastened the deliberations. There seemed to the
wiser ones but one thing to do. It was a partial retreat, taking
with them such conveniently removable articles of great value as
they could gather, and retire together to one of the strong Norman
keep-like erection on the Bolton Road, just over the Dyckman Street
pass to the Hudson River. If extremities, too serious, threatened
them there, escape could again be effected to the river itself
immediately behind, and finally embarkation in some steamboat to
be at once summoned and held in readiness. The season had so far
advanced that the many steam yachts that were familiar features on
the shore line of the river at Carrara were no longer to be seen.
They had retired to the winter station, as at present, near Gowanus
on the Long Island shores.
The last words of directions were spoken by a Duncan, the owner of
the picturesque mansion where they were to find refuge:
“Shut, lock and barricade all the entrances of your homes, the more
passive resistance of that sort we can devise the better. Remove all
valuables, the things you especially value of small size; concentrate
at my home and await relief. It must come! Should we be forced into
an extremity we can beat a retreat to the river and escape. This
seems the safest way. We are powerless against such odds.”
And so the hurried evacuation was made, while signal lights—the
rockets seen by Bomber—arose from point to point as a constant
warning for vigilance and for haste. There was much confusion. In
the short time possible to be employed before the invasion began,
it was out of the question to carry away the many things that each
householder dearly wished to save, and the bustle and struggle of
uncertainty was consequently frequent and prolonged. Doors banged,
improvised barricades were formed against the backs of the entrances,
windows were shut and fastened, the chasing of servants up and down
the stairs, the calls of the younger men and the impatient orders
of the older with many feminine sighs and exclamations were mingled
with the miscellaneous and confused murmurs and more violent noises,
proceeding from the opening and shutting of safe doors, the secreting
of objects of especial interest—and too large for removal—in closets
and cellars, while constantly mishaps, punctuated with cries and
recriminations, arose and added to the panic and disorder.
Amid it all Julieta Lorimer sat in her chamber bowed in prayer for
the safety of her daughter. She had quickly brought together the
jewelry of Helen, and her own, and packed the treasured trinkets
in a small agate-mosaic casket that now lay on the bed in front of
her. All sorts of dreadful possibilities crowded in her mind, racked
to the limit of endurance with fearful surmises, as happening to
her child. The thought of Amato kept up her courage. She knew his
readiness and courage, and she trusted his devotion.
How many wistful pictures of the past filled her mental vista of the
almost forgotten years—the years of Robert’s tempestuous courtship,
the birth of Helen, the increasing affection and chivalrous loyalty
of her husband, the periods of travel over the fair face of the
world, their mutual wonder of the beauty and promise of the girl
growing up in the revolving seasons, and gaining new charms of person
and mind, her splendid adoration of high ideals, and her rich and
embracing love of all human kind, her distinction, the patrician
courtesy, the austere ambition and her peculiar sweetness of thought
and word.
How Robert adored her; she saw them again and again walking together
in a very ecstacy of genial communion, and, as though breathed
upon her from the pregnant air, there came to her there, almost
audibly, the accents of his wonder and delight as he told her of
Helen’s unfolding excellence. She, whose respite from sorrow for
the death of her own loved one, had only come in the intervals of
her proud consciousness of the worth and buoyancy, of her daughter,
now with terrified questionings looked out in the darkening night,
and revolted against the sordid cruelty of circumstance if, in
this vulgar exigency of commotion, that daughter’s life became the
prey of accident. And as she gazed, half immersed in a praying
thoughtfulness, there suddenly came before her eyes in the night the
onrushing apparition of the lamp-lit balloon, in which that very
daughter glided above her to safety. She had tarried long. Carrara
was emptied and yet she remained. In the headlong flight her absence
had escaped attention, even among her own fleeing servants.
And yet she did not stir, for now she thought of Helen’s unhappiness,
the shocking discovery of her uncle’s perfidy, and the miserable
disappointment that had darkened her life. Julieta sighed—she could
not altogether regret it—Amato pleased her more; indeed, thus falling
into reveries, she married him to her, and then the strange fervency
of the desire of both to see the Pope placed in America and the new
missionizing plan rose before her, and she forgot her grief, almost
smiling over the Quixotic dream—for so it seemed to her. And yet no
movement; she saw the thickening clusters of rockets, the frightening
reminder of danger in the sheets of flame in the burning pleasure
house on the hill, and the black crowds of men gathered in slovenly
ranks for mischief. The lights yet burned in her room; she realized
that they prevented any certain view of the outside, and she rose
and extinguished them, and returned to the seat strangely oblivious
perhaps in the indulgence of the luxury of her reveries, wherein she
drew to her side the vanished dead, careless of remembering.
All had become still in Carrara, the shouts smothered in dull calls,
the movement, the sounds of running feet, the opening and shutting
of doors, the interrupted grating discords of shoved furniture and
reinforced bolts and locks—all was quiet, for the refugees had
crushed themselves into the Norman Duncan keep beyond the Dyckman
Road. Here some guns had been distributed, a sort of garrison
armament formed, scouts sent out, and a beleaguered attitude taken.
The precaution was looked after of getting a boat ready at the
water’s side behind them, and after some uncertainty and delay it was
decided, then and there, to remove the women. Under guard the latter
passed down the road to the Hudson in little companies, each with an
escort of armed men. In all this commotion and anxiety, the absence
of Julieta was somehow quite unnoticed.
Events were hurrying on to some fatal denouement among the rioters.
The obstacles, which had delayed the arrival of their stores of guns
and ammunition, and which were rightly explained by Bomber as due to
the desertion of his allies who had been watching them, thus leaving
them strongly locked up, inside barricades demanding destruction
before the agents of the rioters could reach them, had at length
arrived. The distribution of the arms to the men, the preparation
of an advance party with bombs, the slow infiltration of orders to
all the men and companies had consumed much time, and when at length
the host moved forward along the three avenues—Nagle, Post and
Sherman—the hour of nine had long passed.
Bomber had placed himself in the company of bomb-throwers, and the
man who had boasted of his skill in discovering the hiding place
of treasure was at his side. This little group headed the slow and
irregular entrance of the men on the Kingsbridge Road. Immediately
before them was the villa of the Lorimers, its marble terraces
shining spectrally, and the outlined palace above them on the
hillside, destitute of lights, inviting an easy assault. But Bomber
feared some ambush, and he ordered a company of younger men—who
had been acting as scouts for his army—to steal forward, and make
their way through the shrubbery to the top of the eminence, for an
observation of the measures of defence taken by the inmates. The
men returned and told their chief that apparently the house was
deserted. One man had broken in a window pane after forcing a shutter
open, and the sound, sharp and crackling, brought no response. Still
Bomber doubted, and he again ordered the men to push the examination
further, and see the other houses, spy out the gardens, and return.
The men dashed back, they were convinced that there was no danger in
the abandoned Carrara. After a longer absence they again came back,
and made their asseverations so strong that the place was deserted,
that Bomber gave orders for the whole body to ascend the terraces and
capture the ridge.
Julieta Lorimer raised her head; she had indeed fallen into a half
sleep wherein with half muttered prayers and clustering memories her
bewildered and exhausted body and mind had taken refuge. She rose
and moved to the windows again, almost as if in a dream, to see if
there was any sign of her returning daughter. It was the moment in
which Bomber’s spies were hurrying back with their reports about the
deserted Carrara, the moment when Bomber decided to rush forward and
take the houses.
The night was clear but there was no moon, the stars ruled the
skies with a soft and remote beauty, but their effects were less
apparent over the city of that coming day by reason of the spreading
pulsations of the upper light, artificially created and irregularly
distributed over the enormous commonwealth. This light, as Tom Ratler
noticed on the first evening of his arrival was more concentrated
in the lower parts of the city, but it now bathed the foreground
of the scene that Julieta looked out upon, though by it flushes
of brightness alternated, like shifting clouds, with intervals of
penumbral vagueness. Julieta pushed open the windowed door that led
to a balcony and stepped out into the ledge formed by its floor, just
at that instant when the light grew stronger.
She leaned far out, and her white dress formed a contrast with the
shadows on the wall behind her. She was seen by the watching men
in the roadway, and for an instant Bomber suspected treachery. And
then the thought arose with tempting plausibility that SHE—Helen
Lorimer—might have been left alone; this outstretched figure was
hers, and he might now be able, under less humiliating conditions,
than before, to ask for some consideration at her hands. The stupid
dream awoke in him a strange restlessness. He had not been altogether
thoughtless about his appearance either. He wore a khaki uniform
which became him; its contrast with the rude and often torn garments
around their commander had already awakened unfavorable comment.
It was regarded with some dissatisfaction. The broad unrolled soft
chapeau on his head added its theatrical touch, even gauntleted
hands and an unused sabre dangling picturesquely at his manly hip
contributed to an impression of dashing chivalry, which he had quite
serenely noticed himself. He now strode forward to the middle of
the highway, intercepting the movement that had begun to ascend the
terraces, and in a loud voice calling upon all to desist.
“He intended to reconnoitre the place himself. He would give a
signal for the charge as soon as he had convinced himself that
no rascally ambuscade awaited them. He prized their lives, and
rather than risk an unnecessary slaughter would first determine the
nature of the ground before them. One life,” he grandiloquently
concluded, “sacrificed, was better than the loss of many strong men
whose strength was now needed for the Renewal of Society, and the
establishment of the New Republic.”
The grotesque coxcombery of all this struck one man forcibly, and he
cursed the silly display, the bravado of an idiot.
“Why damn him,” he muttered hoarsely—and it was the man of the
lock-picking skill, the man who had plotted with Bomber for the
chance of interviewing the safes in the Carrara mansions—“Damn him;
what good will his maundering over there do. He’s losing time and
enough has been lost now to let those tin soldiers get here with
their pop guns and do us for ever. Bust the whole shee-bang, rip,
tear, and level it! That’s the way and then—GIT.”
Bomber was a mistake and for once the crafty Longtinsky had perhaps
miscalculated. But the element of mistake was in the unsuspected
fancy this apparently well chosen limb of mischief had for Miss
Lorimer, which entangled with his own preposterous personal conceit
made him the easy tool of circumstances and circumstances now most
ludicrously related to his stupid prepossessions. Nothing can be
more mischievous in unsettling a vain man’s sense of relations and
propriety, not to say his more important sense of his own position,
than the foolish imagination of his possible importance in the eyes
of a pretty woman.
Bomber turned his back to his astonished companions, and mounted the
steps with rapid strides, his own conviction growing that the white
figure above him was indeed Miss Lorimer the nearer he approached the
now excited and attending lady who began to awaken from the strange
coma of grief and recollection which had held her enchained in a half
unconsciousness.
Julieta Lorimer slowly recognized her situation, and something like
an intense keenness supervened to make it all plainer to her. She had
somehow failed—she now saw—to join the others when they had deserted
the Ridge, and she was entrapped in her villa, and stood in the face
of the storming rioters. She recalled the commotion of her fleeing
friends, and she remembered she had stolen to her room, and here she
had become isolated in her own sorrowful and oblivious thoughts. Her
faculties were now fully awake; the terror only served to sharpen
her appreciation of the predicament she was in. She did not become
useless in her fear, but her mind engaged quickly and sharply in
the preparation of some sort of defence. Who was this man—a figure
ascending in leaps the marble steps—and why did he come alone? Down
on the Kingsbridge Road she saw the massed men and women and seemed
to discern their faint prolongation back into the avenues. Was it
not strange—this immobile mob, voiceless, ominously still—while this
man—a leader perhaps advanced all alone?
What was to be done; should she escape and pursue her vanished
friends—the thought struck her suddenly that she would rush through
the mansion, and turn on all the lights—she perceived the darkness of
the place—it might create the appearance of relief or occupation. She
hesitated—and there below her under the window’s balcony, the figure
looked up to her, and she heard his voice: and noticed that his hat
was removed from his head, and something in his accents made her
stop, shocked with an incredible impression.
“Miss—Lorimer? I believe—I feel the awkwardness of
this—position—but—time presses—I must enter your home—it is
deserted—you are alone—you may trust yourself to me—it is an honor I
have asked for before, and which then you saw fit to repel—as leader
of a new Revolution—the revolution of the great heart of the people
you may condescend to treat me—less carelessly—” the words were
spoken with a mixture of impudence and menace.
Nothing had escaped Julieta’s ears and her mind worked with the
marvellous concentration of memory, acting under the impelling sense
of a real danger; she divined the situation; she recalled Bomber’s
declaration of love for her daughter—this man is doubtless he—his
name she had heard mentioned as the chief of the mob at her doors—she
knew that relief was under way—that too she had heard—could she delay
this aspirant for Helen’s hand?—keep him awhile—every moment might
help—was she equal to the dangerous ruse? At any rate the evident
delusion of the speaker must be encouraged.
Almost mechanically she asked—“Is this Mr. Bomber?” the question
answered would illuminate the situation, and as she asked it she half
turned away so that that gentleman might not discover his mistake.
“Yes I am Bomber, Miss Lorimer. Alaric Mitchess Bomber—I would be
happy to assist you in this extremity—there need be no alarm—but
the doors of this house must be opened at once—these men—” a
flourish of his scabbard indicated the waiting crowds at the foot
of the slope—“are in earnest—everywhere the forces of revolt are
in motion—the City must succumb—perhaps I could persuade you
to negotiate some sort of compromise with the Aristocracy of
Carrara—Excuse me, I dread violence but this parley cannot be kept up
too long—my men are impatient—”
There flew through Julieta’s mind several projects—and among them
was one of startling possibilities—almost too audacious too, full of
grave consequence to herself—and yet it tempted her by its amazing
daring and shrewdness. She would entrap the leader of the mob—put him
under lock and key—she, Julieta Lorimer!—he should be decoyed into
the house, and she would agree to meet him within, and then—a smile
crept into her face that was darkened the next instant with doubt;
the indecision had been noticed by Bomber, and had elicited his
threat. But the indecision was gone; Julieta committed herself to the
rash expedient—she would take Alaric Mitchess Bomber prisoner. Shades
of Longtinsky!!!
“Alaric”—in her sweetest tones—the figure started and stretched
itself upward—“I will see you in the house—it is possible we can
together do something to prevent mischief, and—if so—perhaps—we
may—” the last words were permitted intentionally to fade away
into nothingness—conveying thereby to the credulous hearer some
indiscreet concession, that made him bound with delight and desire.
“Yes—Yes, Miss Lorimer—may I say Helen?—” the stupidity and dull
conceit of the man made her project seem again very plausible to
Julieta—“but it must be done quickly—it may be necessary for me to
return to the men there”—pointing—“and make them understand—they
might suspect treachery—is there no one in the house? They expected
a fight and they are in the humour for destruction—you see—I will do
all you advise—but——”
“Alaric,” still insinuating and delicious to the ears of the
vanquished leader of revolution, “go tell them you are about to
confer with Helen Lorimer, who speaks for the whole colony of
Carrara—your own eloquence will convince them, or if they cannot be
controlled entirely, tell them to be patient a moment—surely you can
restrain them, and then come TO ME.” Bomber’s arms actually crossed
themselves upon his breast with the unction of an embrace. Julieta
saw it. “And we can at least devise some measure for my safety. That
is but just, is it not?”
“Helen”—the voice was deep with passion and obedience as well—“let it
be so. I will return and speak to them, and _then_ admit—me.”
Julieta hid her face in the silken scarf about her shoulders and
leaned down, whispering. “No one is here. I am alone. Come in at
the front, the iron gateway through the peristyle, through the
front doors. There is a great hall. Ascend the stairway to the
dining-room, and then pass into a side room and await me. The side
room is a butler’s pantry—you can tell it by the one light that will
be alight there. Adieu, Alaric.” The old star of Robert Lorimer’s
improvised show retained her skill, and her Italian hand still showed
a delightful fineness. But then she had such plastic stuff to treat!
Bomber waved his hat, his gauntleted hand touched his lips. He turned
and jumped down the terraces with really splendid youthfulness. His
youthfulness did not desert him in the emergency of getting to the
top of the gate post of the Lorimer estate; he clambered up somehow,
and there in full view, with his hat removed, a few assisting
gestures, he delivered his oration.
“Patriots of the New Order, we are about to accept the capitulation
of the Aristocrats”—a long rising hiss, culminating in a yell
of derision—“Miss Helen Lorimer, of whom we can all admit she
possesses the virtues of her class, with none of their faults”—a
mixed reception of cheers and hisses greeted this admission—“has
agreed to see me in her own palace of art and beauty, and there I
shall be permitted to dictate the terms of surrender. Miss Lorimer
has had the courage to remain, while all her BRAVE”—uttered with
impressive sarcasm—“defenders have fled. I only ask you, my noble
comrades——” Bomber was a traitor; while he spoke these words he was
secretly turning over in his mind the chances of freeing himself
from these now unnecessary associates, and turning body and soul
over to the abhorrent aristocrats. Here was the goal of his fondest
dreams—becoming with Helen Lorimer rehabilitated, and an ornament of
the class he affected to despise.
“I only ask you now to await the results of this interview; when
it is finished you shall enter Carrara and POSSESS it.” He paused,
and a cheer arose; he interpreted it as his permission—he was too
impatient himself to return—he jumped off his elevated rostrum, and
as he turned and ran again backward a voice—loud, soaring, he _knew_
it—shouted in the silence, “Al Bomber you’re a LIAR.”
But Bomber had no desire to refute the statement, his heart burned
with the strangest hopes, and his self inflation, his fatal aptitude
for gallantry approached, as he thought, a new and marvellous
satisfaction. He kept on his way unchallenged.
Julieta left the balcony; her heart beat tumultuously; the trick
was bold, and desperate—it almost seemed. Would she be successful?
There was danger—plenty of it—too; if he suspected; if he brought
men back with him; if his hearers were not affected with the reasons
for gullibility he succumbed to; if she herself could escape—and
WHERE? Certainly the butler’s pantry was a well chosen place for
the incarceration of the dashing leader of the New Order. It was
practically a strong box—literally a safe—with iron walls and
iron doors, where the silver of the family was also kept. Besides
entrance from the dining-room, it possessed but one other egress,
a back door, fastened on the inside. That she believed was already
secured; locked, with the key removed; it was the practice so to do
at night. It was to be her hands that would shove the bolts, upon the
imprisoned Bomber, from the outside, of the very entrance he would
use. Her limbs trembled with the agitation of thinking of the work
before her, but the instant she had groped her way down to the spot,
turned on the single lamp that would announce the rendez-vous and
then secreted herself in an alcove of the dining-room, with her dress
covered by a voluminous black overskirt she felt a singular firmness,
almost a jubilant expectation. She had concluded to rush from the
room at once when the deed was done, and make her way to the Duncan
keep.
Suddenly she bethought her that the doors below, the great gate of
the entrance also were yet shut. Gathering her dress about her, she
descended the stairs, and unlocked and unbolted all. It took time,
some strength was required, and her nervous excitement alone made it
possible to accomplish it. Of course she became visible to one near
at hand, when she pushed her way out into the peristyle, to open the
iron gate of the courtyard. She shivered as she crossed the yard;
her confidence almost deserted her as she saw through the trellis of
the gate the returning figure of the man she was about to capture.
It was indeed only by a superhuman effort she pulled down the huge
bolt for he was close upon her. Bomber had detected the woman form
moving behind the trellis, as he ascended; he knew it was SHE and he
hastened his steps. Julieta felt her heart fail her; she staggered—in
another second, before she could possibly return, he would be at
her side, and the revelation would be made—she turned irresolutely
to run, when an oath almost at her side, as she thought, came to
her ears, and the sound of a falling body. Instinctively she turned
again, and she saw Bomber sprawling on the outer steps—that unlucky
emblem of authority, his sword, had twisted between his legs and
tripped him. It was Julieta’s chance.
She raced up the inner steps—those leading to the dining-room—the
superb banquet-chamber where we have seen Helen Lorimer dispensing
the hospitality of the Lorimers—she crouched in the selected
alcove, not far from the open door of the butler’s pantry, where
the seductive little light gleamed secretively. She stiffened her
resolution, though the mounting beats of her heart warned her of the
terrific strain. She heard the rising footsteps—perhaps a little more
careful since their proud owner had learned the wisdom of caution—and
then something darkened the door of the dining-room. It was he. He
stopped; her shuddering heart shrank within her at the suspicion that
he saw her. No; he passed on, his eye had seen the interior light of
the pantry, and he stood at its entrance. Why did he not enter? The
strain was insupportable, the pale light shone on him, though dimly,
and he seemed to be examining the place as if fearing a surprise. If
he waited longer his accustomed eyes would find her out; there was a
little light diffusing from the lamp in the pantry; her hammering
heart, it felt so, was itself audible in the dead silence.
Julieta had run a serious risk in assigning the butler’s pantry for a
meeting with Bomber. She knew only its peculiar strength and adequacy
for service as a prison; she did not know how it had been left by her
fleeing servants. The great key which locked both the inner and outer
doors was always removed at night by the housekeeper and given to
Julieta. She had not received it that night; it was not in her room;
she concluded it still remained in the door of the pantry, but had
the INNER DOOR BEEN LOCKED? When she descended to the dining-room her
first anxiety was to assure herself of the position of the key. Her
heart leaped when she found it in the keyhole of the outer door, the
door leading from the dining-room. A moment later the lamp was turned
on in the pantry, and she tried the inner door. It had been locked.
Both locks were identical: one key fitted both. They were large
constructions, the key itself ponderous, and it threw three heavy
steel bolts when turned.
So far the trap was ready. One imprudence was committed. She left the
key in the outer door, but in order to execute her design she took
the risk willingly. To insert the key in the dark, to shut the door
and turn the lock would be an involved process, and in the delay,
and possible bungling, her quarry might have more than enough time
to break its net and escape. So the key was left; if Bomber took the
precaution to remove the key before entering the ambuscade and to
pocket it! Julieta would have been thwarted, and only headlong flight
would have saved her.
Bomber still stood at the door of the pantry, almost as if
suspicious; it was thus impossible to close it upon him. He even
stepped back again, possibly puzzled that the figure which, a minute
before had been in the courtyard, should now have so completely
vanished. If he struck a match! If he fumbled around and attempted
to turn on the lights! Julieta grew dizzy at the thought. She cowered
together, her knees trembling, and her hands abjectly pressed
upon her face. He looked again into the pantry and—walked in. His
unmeasured personal conceit had saved her.
Bomber’s eye had fallen upon the lustrous expanse of a superb silver
service-tray; in the half light this immense and beautiful work of
the silversmith, hanging on the wall of the pantry, shone softly,
and displayed invitingly a damasked surface, and its high decorative
borders. It tempted the eye irresistibly. Bomber had actually in his
delight with its richness and, in a feverish anticipation of a great
success, walked to it, and caught his own reflection in the polished
mirror of a central oval of smooth silver. He stooped and observed
that his hair had become artistically disarranged, that his cheeks
glowed, his eyes—yes, he was sure of it—emitted an unusual light, and
his mouth—ah! he smiled, he leaned over to the beguiling picture,
when—what was it?—a sluggish thud, and the click of a shot lock!
He turned like a shot animal, his face convulsed with terror;
the door was shut; he sprang to it with his strength—and it was
considerable—he wrenched at the knob, but though it flew to and fro,
nothing yielded. HE WAS A PRISONER. He looked around him; he leaped
at the inner door and attempted to open it. Locked! No window, no
crevice, no loophole of escape.
“My God,” he groaned aloud, “the she-devil, the tiger, witch, curse
her. Am I trapped here like a rat?”
His face grew almost livid; he raised his voice shouting, yelling,
shriek after shriek in the bootless effort to call help. He hurled
the silver tray at the walls, he searched them with knives but only a
steel wall met his fury. And then he sank back on the only chair in
the room, in a convulsion of sheer rage and agony.
And Julieta, like a flying cloud, her black skirt lost from her in
her flight, sped out of the house, and on the well-known pathway,
down and up steps, in front of and behind low shrubs, through
archways, quicker and quicker she ran on, stumbling now, even
falling, regaining her feet, and yet running on in a vertigo of
excitement, the first stages of a terrible reaction.
But while this half ludicrous _intre-acte_ was taking place, events
outside of them were rushing on to a tragic end. The waiting army
enormously enlarged by the running concourse of sightseers, the
various accessions of the idle and vicious, was waiting the return
of their fatuous leader. A growing discontent, with an increasing
fear that some one had blundered, that time was being lost, that
the police or the soldiers would soon confront them, made itself
apparent. A hubbub of voices was now heard where all, an hour
before, had been silent, and the presage of dangerous work before
them had kept the men grave and dumb. Disintegration was evident.
The disgusted safe-robber felt that, and sneered at the futile idiot
chosen for this work.
Suddenly a distant honk announced an approaching automobile, another
and another—it was coming on fast—the coarse grating alarm sounded
now almost among them. The foremost drew back from the roadway, a
few wandering in the Lorimer grounds, looking up the shining stairs,
slashing at the plants and grumbling aloud, turned back, so that
the vehicle passed between two solid files. It stopped; the door
of the limousine swung open—a tall, thin man alighted. He ordered
the chauffeur to assist him, as he mounted the puffed tire of the
wheel, and was pushed upon the roof of the car. He stood up, and by
the lucky incidence of light from a distant electric lamp he was
revealed. It was the MAYOR.
A long roll of subdued imprecations greeted him, rising with a
sudden access of noise into a clamor of shouts, oaths, and yells.
It increased, the suppressed impatience and their inaction, the
confusion of mind produced by the disappearance of Bomber, some
doubt as to their position, and the disquietude of a sense of
impending failure, all intensified by their hostility to the man
who had vanquished them in an industrial war, merged into an awful
expression of hatred. An abstract alarm sharpened into a real rage
at a concrete personality, and they stormed forward, filling the
highway, surging upon the automobile, while the cries of “Kill him,
kill him,” maddened them to violence. They crushed about the wagon,
and guns came to their shoulders. Not a missile had been thrown; the
passion of the mob vented itself in execrations.
“The Scab,” “He took our bread,” “The Carrara Stool-pigeon,” “Have
him down and tear him to bits,” “Rip his glib tongue out,” “To Hell
with him: He belongs there.”
The seething tide, in another instant would have overturned the
machine. It could not advance. It was wedged in a matrix of solid
humanity; that alone saved it from an ignominious upset.
The Mayor had been silent and held his place; his arms were folded,
and not a word of expostulation as yet. His attitude both vexed and
puzzled the insane mob. For one instant the voices were silenced—it
was the prelude to a murderous design—and then came the clear
startling words, strangely almost weirdly penetrating; “Yes! You
can kill me if you like. The thing is easily done—but you will lose
a friend—I beg to tell you you will lose your fight—” The silence
continued, the Mayor jumped at the chance and his voice rose higher
with that peculiar musical distinctness and charm that Helen Lorimer
had noticed when she first saw him in the City Hall.
“What have you got against me? One thing. I did my duty as the Law
commanded. I put down your Lawlessness. Could I do anything else?
Could you? But is that all I have done? Have I not also restrained
the men who would have destroyed you so far as they could? What is
your grievance? Are you starved? Are you naked? Are you unsheltered?
I know that you are _not_. Labor conditions are not bad here. You
are misled. You have been listening to foolish promises, you have
followed false leaders. You have let envy take the place of sense.
You dream of some sort of a new State. It is called The New Era; no
New Era can be well considered that begins with WAR. Unnecessary,
cruel, careless, brutal WAR! Any Economic idea that starts with WAR
will end with it! It cannot abide. Civil disorder, Civil strife,
means one thing—ANARCHY; and anarchy is not a thinkable civil state.
You might as well—you who are builders—think that a house can stand
which is built out of plumb, out of line—you who are plumbers that
you can have health with broken pipes, and empty reservoirs, you who
are cloth-makers or hat-makers or workers of any sort, that you can
do your labor without tools. You preach SOCIALISM but _society_ comes
first, and society is superior to any theory as to how society shall
be conducted. I think I understand as well as you do much that can be
said for the aims of Socialism, but I understand a great deal better
than you do, much that can be said against it. I too have learned
things. Are you above learning also? These people,” waving his arm
towards the houses of Carrara—“have done you no harm by living.
Would you care to live as they do? Hardly. Cannot we take a lesson
from Nature—a flat world would be an uninhabitable world—a flat
Society—all alike—would be impossible. I will talk this over with
you, but not here. IF YOU WILL ARGUE THIS MATTER WITH GUNS, YOU SHALL
BE ANSWERED WITH GUNS.”
His voice ceased and the silence was for an instant broken by cries
and questions. He had made an impression. The Mayor felt that, and
he was eager to take advantage of the favorable opening. He leaned
forward—when suddenly the Gun Argument, he had invoked, began
somewhere back in the streets toward the Saint George Hill. There was
firing—sharp unmistakable firing. All again was disorder, tumult,
panic. A terrible cry smote his ears.
“Clear out!—the SOLDIERS—make off!” It was true. The two
regiments—the 22d and the 69th—had been partially mustered, and
they were forcing their way down the three avenues towards the
Kingsbridge Road. And thus unexpectedly, shamelessly, this silver
voiced flatterer became to the men in front of him a deceiver—the
traitor had kept them there while the troops gathered; his very words
“_answered with guns_”, was the signal for this assault. The Mayor
realized the awful accusation of this coincidence. He recoiled from
it, his face darkened with suffering. Curses reached his ears, and
then the whistle of a bullet, and he fell backward on the roof of the
car.
An avalanche of men hurled out of the avenues. They were in flight.
The firing came closer. Only the rush of feet was heard. Still
firing, and the despairing race of men past the motionless Mayor
there on the top of the limousine, that, like some slight pebble in a
stream, sufficed to divide the tearing unguided current. And yet none
of those who passed, bore any evidence of wounds. There were none.
The Mayor, in ordering the soldiers had commanded that _dispersal_
not _slaughter_ should first be tried with the rioters. Fear did
its perfect work. It was as the Mayor wished, but he had fallen the
victim of his own imprudence; in a manner, of his own forbearance.
Soon it was all over; the troops emerged from the streets into
the roadway, and the vast throngs, the little army of Bomber, the
idle gazers, the haunting lines of free-booters, had EVAPORATED as
completely as the patch of water on the flagging succumbs to the dry
summer wind that sweeps it into space.
The Mayor was carried into the Lorimer mansion; the soldiers
patrolled the streets; the dispossessed returned, lights spread
over the deserted ridge, doctors hurried to the side of the City’s
executive, Briggs arrived, and, under orders from the Lieutenant
Governor, the surplus of the soldiers marched to the east side to
assist the police and the firemen, who still fought an uncertain
contest with the wily incendiary Putkoff. And in the midst of the
mingling confusion of renewed confidence, the bustle of return,
the flashing telegrams from all parts of the city, the news of the
speeding armaments from Chicago, the resumption of the whirling life
of the huge metropolis, stifled into inaction for a few short hours
by this flurry of insurrection, Helen Lorimer and Amato and Mr. Moser
arrived, and Helen learned all.
Julieta had made her way to the Duncan Keep after her successful
encounter with Bomber, and there became incoherent and dizzy with
fever. She managed to tell her story, and almost the first thing
done when the rehabilitation of the houses began and the colonel of
the regiments came on the scene was to open the now famous Butler’s
pantry. There indeed sat the raving Bomber. He was pale with frenzy.
He leaped at the first man who entered, and only a sharp struggle
overcame him. As he passed down the steps of the mansion, handcuffed,
he encountered Amato and Helen hurrying upward, but he averted
his eyes, and the bitterness of his defeat, the confession of his
shallowness and vanity made him writhe with anguish.
Helen had asked for her mother. Julieta had been very carefully
conducted back to her home, and lay in her bed yielding to the first
vagaries of a disordered mind. Helen stood at her side and leaning
over the changed flushed face of the beautiful woman whispered her
name, and pressed her lips upon her own. Julieta opened her eyes and
her hands feebly closed over the head of her child, holding her in a
delirium of joy. But the strained nerves gave way, and she relapsed
into a kind of inanition awaking at times to beckon from the air some
shape appearing there to her, as she called softly, “Robert, Robert.”
Then Helen herself surrendered. The ordeal had been a long one, and
this climax of anxiety, with the strange vicissitude of the Mayor’s
extremity in her own home, completed the breakdown. Still it was not
serious, and nourishment and rest would restore the strong nature to
its natural estate.
The Mayor’s condition was critical; life ebbed and returned; the
doctors camped at his bedside; skill and art and experience worked
hard together to keep him alive, yet sensibly the flagging heart
released its control, and the solemn end grew more and more certain.
Then it was—the next day in the afternoon—that the dying man asked
for Miss Lorimer. He knew where he was, from time to time in the
brief intervals, when pain left him, his eyes reviewed the decorated
and charming room, dwelling with such a depth of tender interest on
all these things that recalled—how pathetically who shall say—the ONE
love of his life.
Helen came. The Mayor lay in the room of her uncle—the man who had
separated them. It was a luxurious apartment, with every appointment
perfect, and its windows opening to the west, in the sinking
November day caught the last lights over the russet and gold of the
Palisades. The Mayor lay on the bed, with his face turned to the
flushing western sky, rent as it were, with seams of gold, as though
the purple tapestry of the clouds were torn, and the gateway of the
sun’s descent disclosed. Helen stood at the doorway; she had come
noiselessly, and waited for her own heart to beat less wildly. A
doctor held the Mayor’s wrist, timing the sullenly retreating tide of
blood from his young heart; a nurse bent over him. Both happened to
hide Miss Lorimer from him.
The doctor turned, the nurse moved away, the Mayor’s eyes fell on
the face of the woman who there awaited his summons. It came from
those blue eyes whose mystery had first enchanted her. And her own
answered them. Slowly she came forward, and sank into the chair the
doctor had just deserted. The Mayor looked past her for one moment
at his attendants, and a mute entreaty they read in his face, caused
them both to withdraw.
“Pardon me, Miss Lorimer,” said the doctor, “I must soon return.”
Helen bowed her head, a gesture of the doctor’s summoned the nurse
and the two went out together. Helen had taken the dying man’s hand;
she held back the struggling tears; his own eyes were strangely soft
and winning, the effort of this interview brought again some color
to his face—but so very little!—the pitiful remnant of his wasting
life—and his voice, that appealing musical voice just retained or
recovered its former note. She bent her face close to his as he spake.
“Miss Lorimer,” he began, but this noble girl whispered, “let it be
Helen please,” and he smiled, “Helen,—you recall that talk we had in
the museum,—your new museum—?”
“Yes,” she quietly responded.
“Well, here in my wandering dreams I have gone over it for hours. You
have always been near me, and your voice has sounded to me almost as
if it bore to me the music of another World”—his face darkened with
the overwhelming torrent of his sadness, but no sobs broke from his
lips. The spasm of grief passed, she pressed his hands, she wiped the
stricken eyes, she slid softly from her chair, she knelt at his side.
“Helen, I go too with the setting sun—my day is finished—I thank the
Everlasting that it passes thus. But let me be clear in your eyes.
Your uncle drove me from this house. My pride could not brook his
insult. Helen, my love has never ceased, never changed. Death only
takes away its earthly dwelling place, and IF—If, as you began to
teach me, there is still life THERE”—he pointed feebly to the blazing
west—“if there is, there too my love will stay unchanged. Ah! the
long day’s task is done, and I must sleep. But Helen you forgive
me”—then with an ardor that made the girl before him pale with
apprehension that the untoward passion would put out the fluttering
flame of life, he added—“Helen have I still your Love?”
The woman bent her face to his; their lips met—a golden light entered
the windows, it filled the room; it was so intense and brilliant
that objects seemed lost in it; it dazzled as though an etherialized
substance suffused the space, blotting out all definite shape, and
enthralling all the senses in the captivity of one. It was so for
the interval of half a minute, and then again the depleted room was
established in the commonplaces of its utilities.
The doctor and the nurse had returned, and behind them came the
bowed form of the Mayor’s mother, led by Mr. Briggs. Helen rose and
passed to the window, her eyes straining at the spectacle of glory in
the clouds. To her catholic heart and nurture it seemed appallingly
cold and ruthless, this passage of a soul into the awful futurity,
unattended by prayers, unaccompanied by the offices of devotion, with
no sensible presentation, still to hold the dissolving corporeal
powers fixed in adoration that the soul might more purely, more
wisely, pass on to its new appointments, rising on the wings of
aspiration.
The strength of a tremendous religious faith was hers, and in that
strength her lips repeated the Orison of Help for the dying.
A half-stifled cry, a movement behind her, caused her to turn. The
doctor was taking away the stunned mother of the man who had already
just made his confession to her ears. Helen passed quickly to her
side, took her in her arms, and brought her out of the room, passing
through a crowd of men, officers of the city,—state and citizens, and
gently made her way to her own chamber, with a tenderness that was
itself a ministration of healing to the crushed heart, the hopeless
spirit of a Mother.
THE MAYOR WAS DEAD.
CHAPTER XVII
THE POPE COMES TO AMERICA
The Mayor was buried with splendid pomp. His body lay in state;
the militia who flocked back as the alarm over the city’s dilemma
spread to the neighboring cities, with the garrisons of the regular
troops, who had also returned, formed his escort, and the music
at his funeral touched the limits of elegiac elaboration. A sense
of his excellence as an administrator, a sudden recognition of
his intellectual delicacy and skill, combined with the thrill of
admiration felt at his daring in confronting the rioters, the relief
that followed the dispersal of the insurrection together with the
repudiation of the whole Longtinsky anarchistic plot by the sane and
moderate socialistic organs contributed to elevate his memory, and
imbue his name with a peculiar—to some a mystifying—glory of renown
and nobility.
When all was over, the huge city-state resumed its myriad activities,
and for a while the political asperities abated, the differing
parties vanished, and the warring sections of society forgot or
dissembled their mutual hatred. The exhortations of the Mayor
were printed on cards, sold as mottoes, or decorated the pages of
the newspapers. He was regarded as a martyr, a sacrifice to the
turbulence and wickedness of agitators and plotters, and, with
something like a religious ecstacy the people idolized his memory,
and before the adoration, clamor, discord, petulance and envy,
for a time, hid themselves. A wonderful peace prevailed, and the
magnificent metropolis turned to its avocations or its pleasures with
unrestrained energy and delight.
Mr. Briggs, who now worshipped the memory of his master, became
attached to a newspaper, and furnished periodic outbursts of
Cassandra-like prophecy over the dark future which threatened society
at large, and while they, when read aloud, had a portentous sound,
and a certain rhetorical ornamentation with enough penetration to
make them significant, they were generally wisely put aside as
sophomoric and unnecessary. Mr. Briggs brought the Mayor’s mother
to his home, and this partnership proved wonderfully consoling
to the afflicted lady. Mr. Briggs lived in one of the charming
colonial restorations of the Greenwich village area of the city, and
maintained—though a bachelor—an establishment of considerable dignity.
Of course Tom Ratler survived his encounter with Poni, and seized the
fruits of his popularity with the gentle and pretty Jessie Longtinsky
and she discovered upon the death of her father, that a moderate
competence was hers. The conspirators—at least the formidable Bomber,
Madder, Putkof, and Poni himself—were put behind the bars for a
practically life period, and no ingenuities of law were expended in
proving the injustice of this arrangement. As to the rest, hundreds
of whom were under arrest, a general amnesty was proclaimed, and
the prisoners who had brought about the famous trial, all, except
Polinck, were discharged; Polinck being reserved for another trial.
In this general dispensation of urbanity and moderation none rejoiced
more than Helen Lorimer. She undertook the education and advancement
of the abnormal child Angelo Shimura, and especially she turned
to the project she had discussed so long ago with the Mayor—her
Museum—and which now might become a sort of memorial of the man
himself—with almost religious ardor.
The question of the classes still remained unsettled, and Helen
Lorimer as the apostle of the essential necessity of a _classified_
Society, with the avenues of promotion fully created through
education, and with emphasis laid upon the essential mutual
interaction of all parts of Society with particular reference
to the indispensable patriotism and benevolence—in a large and
economic sense—of the upper classes, began again her instructions,
and readings, and writings. For a time, Amato felt her intellect
put aside the claims of her emotions or else—WAS IT, that in this
outburst of energy and propagandist zeal she sought again in some
esoteric way, the companionship of the man she deeply mourned. The
splendid magnanimity of Rudolpho found no fault with this. There
was a little hurt, a little uneasiness and dismay perhaps, but the
gentleness of his nature, the fine heroism of his feelings, quickly
restored his equanimity and he followed at her side, encouraged all
her attempts, aided her designs, and so patiently and wisely obeyed
her wishes that he entered deeper and deeper into her affections, and
captivated her anew by the beauty of his unselfishness.
It was a few weeks after the death of the Mayor that a most
unexpected occurrence brought the man’s personality again vividly
forward and reawakened in Helen Lorimer the half forgotten plan
to strengthen the religious life of the country by establishing
the Pope within it. The latter project had momentarily lost its
interest, though with Cardinal Fenton, who now fully understood
the inevitable union of his nephew and Miss Lorimer, it had only
suffered a temporary suppression. Conditions indeed in Europe
became more and more insupportable for the Church. The exorbitant
so-called civilization with the still surviving colossal selfishness,
viciousness and hollowness of the representatives of inherited
privilege, had produced through two opposite influences an almost
total repudiation of religion, looked at in large way, and as
representing a national feeling.
First the strong socialistic tendencies—verging into radical phases
contemplating the extermination of Society as constituted—denied
the tenets of formal religion, and advised its abolition; second,
the sensual and sensational inclinations of the upper classes had
reached ruinous proportions. They amounted to a moral devastation.
Europe, advanced in the methods of enlivening life by exciting
appetite, had also become eclipsed in its intellectual aspects by
the hebetude that succeeds satiety, and religion was laughed at or
cultivated as a cloak to deceive the herd. The tabernacles were
empty, the priests were useless, the Pope was impoverished, the
prestige of the Church had vanished.
Cardinal Fenton realized sorrowfully that in the protestant
Teutonic nations religion yet held its sway more rigorously,
than in the former homes of his own church; that Russia, somehow
barricaded within a wall of barbarous autocracy and childish slavish
superstitions maintained its quondam religious expression almost
unchanged. To him and an advanced group of Catholic prelates in
Europe and America a surmise that American influences somehow
established the Church, renovated and revivified it had become a
conviction. To them for some years the dream of bringing the Pope
to America, of—the language was decorously veiled in its apparent
significance—liberating him from the somnolent antiquities, the
enthralling traditions, the half ludicrous isolation, or, to quote
language used less obsequiously, a hundred years before, by Father
McGlynn, of putting the Pope in the streets of New York with a
stove-pipe hat on his head, had become more and more alluring.
Here in America the Church had shuffled off the encumbering follies
which had grown up within her through a constant association with
a system of privilege, of monarchy, of the artifices of title and
place. In America, in a sweet exhilarating air of free institutions,
universal opportunity, and amid fresh pure aspirations for happiness,
the Church forgot cabals and intrigues and politics, and generated
itself in a region apart, in worship, good deeds, lofty teachings,
sacramental offices, and enveloped, at least by implication ALL,
under the aegis of its divine commission. Its personnel became
saturated with sense and sympathy, and no more useful men than its
priests could be found in practical charity, educational enthusiasm,
and broad philosophic erudition. Protestantism had almost protested
itself out of existence.
To this New World let the Pope come. It seemed to men like Fenton,
the last chance, the last entrenchment wherein the incessant fight
against Negation might be fought. And to pious Catholic patriots
it seemed that so good a possession as the Pope belonged to their
own dear country. On the other hand it meant the uprooting of an
established identification of Rome and the church of two thousand
years, something almost appalling to conceive of. Should the arc
of that covenant be ruthlessly touched—even though it shook and
tottered—by the modern Uzzahs of this movement?
Yet many believed the violent disruption desirable. As in a sedentary
organism parasitic things, mere unavailing accidents had become
encysted in the outward tissue of the Church, enfeebling it. These
would be dislodged, shaken off, and left behind. They had been
debilitating and even malign. Tone, a freshened vigor, a stronger,
readier, adaptive stage to the new outlooks in the New World would
succeed, or by another imagery, the barque of the Church launched
upon a broader, brighter sea would free itself of old wrecks,
floating debris, the relics of mistakes, collisions, abandoned
cargoes, the barnacle growths of centuries, and sail forward to new
ports with certainty and power. The encrustations of foolish practice
the mere hindrances of time-honored but stupid devotions—as that of
the Bambino—would be swept away, and the Church more intellectually
more healthfully, with a freer scope of thought, and with No Loss
of essential dogma would confront her enemies, her critics, the
whole antagonistic World, still championing the claim of her divine
authority.
Helen Lorimer and Cardinal Fenton had often talked over all these
things; for years the latter cherished the idea with a foolish
fervor. Gradually the number of adherents grew. It was recognized
as an inner illuminated circle, and without any formal pledges,
secrecy was self imposed and sternly guarded. Entrance to the College
of Cardinals at Rome had been effected, and with every renewed
outburst of hostility to the Pope, not only were the convictions of
the sympathizers strengthened but new converts were gained. At one
time, the moment alluded to in a former chapter when Helen Lorimer
and Amato met in the library of the Cardinal, the approaching crisis
seemed imminent and the little Society of the Americanists, as its
members called themselves, was transported with hopeful expectations.
But disappointment—a crushing reversal of all their dreams followed.
The Pope caught ear of the revolutionary scheme, denied and denounced
it. It became doubtful whether or not some sort of Bull might not
threaten the extermination of the cult, and put on it the stigma of
heresy. With this danger hanging over them everything became still,
and the frightened colleagues no longer ventilated their hopes, or
even indulged in the precarious pleasure of consoling each other.
Cardinal Fenton bided his time. His knowledge of the crumbling state
of the European religious institution was too large and keen to
permit him to doubt some eventual catastrophe.
Helen Lorimer plunged into her humanitarian and civil schemes. Amato
said nothing. He was her faithful hand servant, always ready, always
sympathetic, ever gracious, loving, willing and enchanting. So the
thought of the Pope’s Importation, as it was half ironically referred
to—had apparently been forgotten when the thing happened which again,
by some peculiar reasoning, brought it back compellingly into Helen
Lorimer’s mind; and almost immediately something else happened in
Europe that actually won for it toleration and final accomplishment
there.
In America the momentous influence with Miss Lorimer was a posthumous
publication of a little book by the Mayor—the MS was found among his
papers by Mr. Briggs—entitled MORE LIGHT. It created a sensation.
None read it more excitedly than Helen Lorimer, Cardinal Fenton,
and Amato. Helen detected in it some of her own ideas literally
reproduced, and saw plainly a deeper influence pervading it, which
she knew was hers also. The book made the Mayor live again before her
eyes and live even more strangely and despotically within her heart.
Amato knew this, and a sharp pain sprang through his being but he
persisted with the same admirable temper, and no reproach rose to his
lips, not even a trace of the almost insupportable knowledge could be
discerned in his words, or his behaviour. As ever he did her bidding
with incomparable zeal.
The book began with an eloquent and convincing picture of the World’s
distress, the aimlessness, fragility, hopelessness, pettiness of
life in millions upon millions of human beings, the astonishing
and apparently purposeless fecundity of the race, the silence of
the grave, the depravity and meanness of mere living—and then
in chapters, fervid with wonder and despair it pointed out the
extraordinary inadequacy of Revelation, even when supplemented by all
the authority and beauty of the Church—and it closed with a thrilling
imploring appeal to the shut and silent skies, urging the whole Earth
through its manifold organs of utterance to upbraid and beseech those
skies, to force their mocking canopy of blue to open and let down
new vessels of Consecration and of Knowledge. It was well conceived,
skillfully graded in a progression of intense feeling to its climax,
and it enlisted a lyric power of expression which caught the reader
in the broad and noble flow of its imagery and emotion.
Helen Lorimer had read the book aloud to her Mother—still unwell—and
to Amato in the great library of her home. It was a room the reader
has not entered, and it was the chief treasure of the marvelous
palace. It lay in a northern section of the mansion with its roof
upheld by columns of Numidian marble. The ceiling in groined vaults
sprang from capital to capital and each vault held the golden picture
of a constellation set in a blue background. The book-cases in square
rose-wood boxes encased the columns at their bases; only at two
points around the room did the book-cases rise higher than four feet,
and here on both the east and west walls latticed shelves carried
the books almost to the high ceiling. Everywhere upon the low cases
stood marble busts and Barye bronzes. The walls were fairly covered
by paintings, though they might easily have been increased in numbers
without exhausting the ample space. Windows pierced the walls above
the book-cases on the sides, nowhere reaching the floor, and only one
entrance permitted access to this generous study.
The north end of the library was surrendered to the installation
of a gigantic fireplace built of a soft sienna terra-cotta brick,
with a high broad marble mantle above it, on which was placed a
marble _replica_ of the Hudson-Fulton Water Gate, while over that
on the wall above hung an entrancing painting of the East River in
the Morning when the pearly exhalations of the dawn, the smoke of
a propeller and the projecting cliffs of the bridge-piers and high
buildings, with the tracery of the bridge cables and roads compose
one of the most wonderful metropolitan pictures on the entire earth.
Sheraton chairs and tables were pleasantly disposed throughout the
room, and on the tables were objects of interest and beauty. The
floor was covered from end to end and from side to side with a
deep cramoisy-red carpet that gave luxurious warmth to the whole
room; green tapestries framed the windows, and the illumination was
achieved by opaline globes from the apex of each groined vault while
on the tables burned oil lamps of captivating designs in glass and
brass. The room was almost too grandiose, too public and expositional
in character, but its beauty was really remarkable and the first
impression on entering it was memorable. The books were not numerous,
many book-shelves were empty; the lowness of the book-cases precluded
a very large collection.
The winter had grown cold and now, at the end of February a heavy
snow mantled the Inwood ridge, and Carrara amid its leafless trees
rose from the dazzling surface, an indifferent rival of its purity.
The wind drove through the ranged mansions, the bleak highway was
deserted, but at night, as ever, enhanced in its strange loveliness,
the electrical aureole crowned the huge metropolis, this monumental
city-state where hurrying feet sought work and pleasure, and vice and
devotion and labor followed their designed and inevitable tasks.
Julieta, Helen Lorimer, and Amato sat in front of the great hearth
and the eyes of two watched the scurrying wisps of blue and yellow
light moving waywardly over the blocks of coal. The third—Helen—was
somewhat behind the other two at a round table reading. The last
sentence of the Mayor’s book was heard; it ran, “the Revelation,
the churches, our spirits—to-day the sole witnesses to God—move
in regions of persuasion exorbitantly feeble for the purposes of
Conviction in this matter, and, through the avenues of prayer, by
which all our needs should receive consideration, we ask, or may ask
for a SIGN.
“If God answers, the world emerges into a welcome light of
reassurance, and, if there is no answer, then seizing, as it were
the reins of things ourselves, let society resolve into new units of
action, in conformity with the demands of an utilitarian UTOPIA.”
The voice was clear and penetrating with an indefinable sweetness in
it that thrilled Amato—as it had often thrilled the dead writer of
these pregnant words. There was a silence, and again the voice was
heard:
“Those are sad, they sound to me as dreadful words. It is the
expatriation of Hope, the convulsion of despair, and that means the
Death of the Soul. If only those who ask so much could FEEL; their
questions would then die on their lips.”
“No,” answered Amato, “perhaps not. The thought is plain enough and
as he—the author puts it—it does not really seem so unreasonable. It
has a noble ring after all.”
“But,” continued Helen, “the SIGN is here. Surely you, Rudolpho
Amato”—a start brought the listener’s face around towards the
speaker, and it was filled with an almost strained attention—“know
there can be for Us, you and me”—Amato’s eyes grew tender and
grateful—“but one sign. It is the CHURCH; THAT IS THE COVENANT. To
go beyond it, outside of it, away from it, is to stumble heedlessly,
and to stumble too, unforgiven and unhelped”; it almost seemed to
Amato that the voice grew a little hard. And yet at that very moment
his own heart leaped with a great joy—it meant Helen’s return to him
from the personified Memory that had so weirdly and just perceptibly
separated them.
Amato looked a minute longer at the wonderfully beautiful and earnest
woman and then turned to the dancing flickers before him, saying:
“Are honest doubts to be so harshly punished?”
“It is the LAW,” quickly answered the woman, and in her eagerness she
rose, the Mayor’s book closing behind her on the table; “we cannot
extricate ourselves from our own conditions: we are not permitted
to criticise them. It is not a question of whether this is the best
possible world. Rather is it a question, is this a world at all?—are
we here—is anything a reality? If one allows himself to drop into
the bottomless pit of Negation, HE IS LOST. Faith—faith only is the
solvent of doubt and—it must be either Faith or doubt. Yes, there can
be works, good works, this Man”—the voice paused an instant—“was a
worker, a hard, belligerent, noble worker—works it seems to me attest
to some sort of faith—but as far as the possibility of deliverance
from this Order of things appears, it is only through Union with
God—IN THE CHURCH”; something then happened—who can say what it
was—Amato turned—the woman had sunk back into her chair—her head lay
in her hands upon the table and she was sobbing. In an instant—so
rapid was he that his figure passing through the room might have
seemed almost moved by thought—Amato was kneeling at her side, his
hand pressed upon her shoulder. “Helen?” he said.
The face lifted—a smile broke through the tears—she stood up and drew
him to her—and then—she turned and left the room. Amato watched her
with his hands pressed to his breast; he looked towards Julieta—she
was fast asleep.
The next day the morning papers brought a new astonishment into
thousands of households throughout the New World. The Vatican had
been assaulted—an armed mob had invaded the gardens of the Pope’s
palace, and the Pope himself had retreated to St. Peter’s wherein
he was literally barricaded, while the troops of the state remained
on the defensive at its doors. The event in itself was astonishing
enough, but the most serious feature of the situation was the
temporizing, supine, almost approving policy of the government.
Catholics were terror stricken at the almost inconceivable
predicament. This news was received on Saturday.
The next morning at the Cathedral of St. Patrick’s, Cardinal Fenton
rose in the pulpit and to an enormous audience, among whom sat
Helen Lorimer and Amato, delivered a sermon of marvellous skill and
boldness. The note of defiance rose in it at times, to be succeeded
by invocations to the loyalty of believers, and to be followed
by denunciations of Europe as brutal, perverted sterilized, and
hopeless. Then came passages of extraordinary novelty. The speaker
dwelt upon the forlorn and debilitating position of the Church in
Europe—enveloped in a false civilization, of privilege, of title, of
social selfishness, turpitude, and callous heartlessness; he pointed
out the enfeebling influence of the association through centuries,
with the prejudices, misconceptions, and artificial structure of a
society that through interior decay presented only the glazed and
ornamented shell of civilization, and was decomposing into some final
product of sensuality and atheism.
Then he turned his contemplative gaze upon America, strong in its
immense material power, resolute in its support of its original
contentions in civic life, fortified beyond belief by the average
elevation of the masses who found in it peace, education, competence,
and opportunity. Yet here again the note of complete confidence
wavered and there was betrayed a deep misgiving. The recent
socialistic or anarchistic outbreak was analysed as the ebullition
of hatred and envy as also the symptom of a deep-seated disorder—the
false theory of the State as a collective organism with indisputably
no individualistic rights, a formless mass of industrial units,
animated by a vacuous sentiment of brotherhood, and destitute of the
power of real and vitalizing progress, because the Individual was
thwarted in his ambitions and denied his preeminence.
He paused a moment to dwell on popular vices, on indulgences,
on luxury, on the growth of pernicious habits, on the schism of
self-destruction, and then quoting an old author of the Nineteenth
Century—George Santayana—he proceeded “if a noble and civilized
democracy is to subsist, the common citizen must be something of a
saint and something of a hero. We see therefore how justly flattering
and profound and at the same time, how ominous was Montesquieu’s
saying that the Principle of Democracy is VIRTUE.”
From this point on to his peroration Cardinal Fenton pressed the
contention that the Church was indeed the safe-guard, and vindication
of Virtue; the terms he presented were inexorable, the consequences
of their rejection disastrous. But with again startling emphasis he
predicted the approach of the last conflict between Satan and God.
He urged upon grounds of sanity and strategy and experience that the
Church entrench herself, gathering in her forces, concentrating her
energy, establishing her prestige within the United States of America
where alone to-day, he concluded “her beauty is most ravishing and
irresistible, her efficacy most transcendental, her sanctuaries
most honored” and then in rushing winged sentences he plead for the
Translation of the Pope—of the Vicar of Christ—“to these western
shores where with the Faithful he shall yet defend this foot-stool of
the Most High against the swarming emissaries of Hell.”
The sermon was literally reproduced in the great dailies, indeed
printed copies of it were despatched over the entire country
throughout the larger cities, and in a moment, in the interval
between the setting of one sun and the rising of the next, the
reflective mind of the nation confronted an extraordinary proposition.
Censure, approval, comment and derision met it, but by some
psychological sequence, it became an absorbing and interesting
question that assumed greater and greater reality. Helen Lorimer’s
apathy vanished. She seized anew upon the discarded hope, and somehow
it worked harmoniously with her repudiation of the claim or plea
made in the Mayor’s book. The Pope established in America should be
the Sign—no other; in the displacement of his two thousand year’s
residence in Rome, in the abolition of an ancient glory, in the
new growth and sanctification of the Church in this free land—in
these things should be seen the Hand of God. Amato was no less
enthusiastic. He worked at the same problem and exerted all his art
and fluency to win converts.
The sensation caused by the Cardinal’s sermon was even greater
in Europe than in America where the custom of free speech was
recognized. Abroad its impact upon the formalized ears of the
dignitaries of the church was stunning. And yet there was no
resentment. Dismay and consternation spread, but not in remonstrance,
only in a heart breaking attitude of amazement that this extremity
should be so boldly risked. And deeply working, the leaven of this
suggestion—not unknown before to many, even well considered by many,
as we have seen in Amato’s report to the Cardinal—was converting the
heart of the POPE himself.
Suddenly there appeared a bull—_Ecclesia renovata et migratoria_—and
the edict was issued that the Pope would abandon Europe, walk out
of Rome, and transfer the seat of his See to the shores of America.
Amazing contradiction, when a few months before, this same procedure
had been anathematized. But Inconsistency is the secret of Progress.
The dilemma was sternly stated, the whole bull was minatory and yet,
in places it was tearful with lamentations, which in rolling Latin
had a most august solemnity. It was a moment of violent transition.
The bull, unannounced, unreviewed, calmly thrown into the faces of
the Propaganda, and the Congregation awoke no terrible opposition.
Cardinal Fenton by a stroke, had won. The position in Europe had
become unbearable. But it was an act of superb renouncement, of
stupendous humiliation; the emptying of its Glory by the Head of the
Church; the stripping bare to flesh and bone of the notorious and
priceless apparel which time, and devotion, and wealth, had dressed
him in; for it was ordained that He come to America as a Man among
men—a world-traveller seeking a new home, as of one who had nowhere
to lay his head. It was indeed a prostration, a vast penance, a
dislocation that at last severed the Church from its awful past, a
past superb in its spiritual conquests, but a past also black with
sins.
The house was made ready. It crowned the low hills of Staten Island.
Everything was provided by Helen Lorimer. She hastened every
preparation, with pride, with gayety, with love—for the pact had been
made between her and Amato that the Pope should marry them. At last
it seemed to Amato that the Mayor no longer ruled in her heart; the
conflict was quite passed, and he—he alone possessed her.
And the Pope came. He came in analogy with the whole wonderful and
incredible procedure. He came in conformity with just the requirement
which the jealous and suspicious temperament of the country he
visited, required. He came as a priest with priests, without pomp,
or retinue, or vestments. The affair had been anticipated with a
new delight by hundreds of thousands who rejoiced in sensations, in
spectacles, in violent surprises, in the climaxes of public events.
And it had been most curiously regarded by that protestant portion
of the society, which, a hundred years before, would have been
thrown into paroxysms of revolt, consternation, and rage, at the
mere thought of the transference of the Roman See to this country.
Now, at a time when spiritual power among their churches seemed so
near extinction, they hailed it with pleasure, with the most cordial
congratulations, and with actual endorsement. This very attitude had
been in a way expected by Cardinal Fenton, who saw how immensely it
ameliorated the abrupt Transition on both sides of the religious
fences.
The former of these groups—those who looked for some monumental
display of ceremony—was disappointed. It was all so quiet, so
informal, so commonplace, that except for its momentous moral
significance, it hardly stirred the surface of events with a
perceptible disturbance. Nothing could have been less phenomenal
or less memorable. Art and calculation had combined to make
its impression, as a physical event, almost imperceptible. But
the expatriation of the Pope was an extraordinary fact, and
no suppression of external show could minimize its stupendous
implications. It indeed marked a crisis in the religious life of the
whole world.
The Pope left Rome _incognito_, traversed France, embarked at
Havre, reached New York, was received by a committee, itself so
inconspicuously constituted, as scarcely to receive notice in the
public prints, and taken in a closed carriage to the modest mansion,
adjoining a small but beautiful chapel—the whole installation devised
by Helen Lorimer and Cardinal Fenton, and its expense wholly defrayed
by her—on the highest hill of Staten Island.
There was really something quite abnormal and disillusionizing
in it all. The Pope had even for the time divorced himself from
the appurtenances of his immense establishments. The Index, the
Inquisition, the Propaganda, the vast complicated machinery of
extension and distribution remained at Rome. The Pope alone appeared
at the threshold of the New World, coming without any artifice of
show and pageantry. It had something evangelical and primary about
it, and touched the imagination favorably. A wave of affection went
out to the prelate, and the absence of rebuke or injurious derision
marked a subtle influence propitious to the Cardinal’s project. The
personality of the Pope himself helped this delightful result. He
was charming, and tactful, and intellectually strong. He had already
said beautiful and true things about America. He had captured her
attention, and approval, long ago. Protestant bigotry restrained
itself, and the sightseers and the indifferent wondered, smiled
and applauded. It was all excellent throughout, and Pope Sextus
celebrated his first Mass in America without remonstrance, without
disturbance, almost without comment. He was indeed a Bernard of
Clairvaux.
Later the inevitable happened. That vast insatiable appetite for the
marvelous, and the recondite, and ritualistic, with its tremendous
possibilities of satisfaction, which the Catholic Church nurtured,
demanded its conditioning approval. It could only be given on one
assumption, that the resources gathered through ages of ceremonial
development, magnified by the most modern auxiliaries of light and
music should be employed to memorialize and establish the monstrous
revolution. Unless the seal of the Supernatural rested upon it, its
triumph would be temporary and crumbling. Thus, spontaneously and
together, the Catholic congregations throughout the country prepared
a glorious and stupifying Jubilee. In it the ardor of devotion,
the zeal of faith, and the pride of sect united with a discernible
prophetic instinct, to make it unparalleled. An incredible skill
controlled it. Cardinal Fenton and his agents were everywhere,
bringing the products of thought, of eloquence, of allusion, to be
inwrought and perpetuated through the myriad-tongued utterances of
its sermons and addresses. And in the midst of it with the most
thrilling nobility of style the POPE appeared at St. Patrick’s
Cathedral, as its cause and inspiration.
Pope Sextus was a peculiar man, shaped in a mould of mental, moral,
and physical perfection; perhaps the only Pope, that ever ruled the
Church, who could have taken this precarious step, a step threatening
such monstrous revulsions, and so inevitably endangered by collapse,
ridicule, the extinction of personal prestige as the Pope separated
himself from seclusion, and all the veils of splendid and historical
accidents. For once the MAN stood out before the world in the
habiliments of the street, as it were. He was not found at the end of
long corridors, mysteriously guarded by chamberlains and soldiers,
fixed beneath a canopy, and surrounded by the marvels of art. He
had abdicated all that, and his PRESENCE was in the open. It was an
ordeal, a shock that only the rarest combinations of qualities could
meet and survive. And the Pope met it and survived. This was the
magnificent fact that brought a profound ecstacy to Cardinal Fenton,
to Helen Lorimer, to Amato, and the leaders of this bold innovation.
But the Pope himself—he alone—made it possible.
A reporter of the New York Times, who attended the Pope’s Mass
at the Cathedral, thus described him: “The Pope seems young, but
that impression is dissipated when his bearing, action, voice, and
eloquence are considered. At first I could only think of the St.
Gabriel depicted by Guido where the young and stalwart archangel
descends with his sword upon the head of the falling Satan. His
type is certainly not blond, yet it is noticeably less dark than
the typical Italian. His hair is brown or chestnut, luxuriant, and
in light rolling waves surmounts a brow of fine proportions, in a
countenance of the most pronounced beauty. It is quite impossible to
describe the power of his eyes which appear always soft and tender,
and yet have a peculiar indefinable penetration. He is utterly apart
from the conventional pope, with a skull cap, and no hair, diaphanous
features, and the filminess of ascetic depletion, imparting to him a
ghostly sacredness. The Pope is probably fifty; the first impression
of youth is effaced as you watch him, and, above all, as you hear him.
“The service was a pontifical mass grandly rendered, the music
subdued, and full prominence was given to the celebrant, who was the
Pope himself. It was a lesson in the majesty and music of the human
voice. Never (and as a catholic I constantly attend mass), have I
heard singing so moving and ideal. But that again was forgotten, when
the superb figure—the Pope is tall—rose in the pulpit, and the same
entrancing voice preached from the Text; ‘Lo I am with you Always.’
“Here he was miraculous. His self assertion was most puzzling
but it was ineffaceable. He moved from appeals to historical
description, and from these to argument, and then decorating
everything with poetry, he threw all aside, and revealed himself as
The Vicar of Christ on Earth. It seemed appalling, the intensity
of his confidence, and yet more amazing it seemed convincing. As
he retreated to the altar, an anthem of Hayden’s broke forth in
delicate and joyous strains, its musical pulsations wavering over
the prostrate multitude, who were about to receive the Apostolic
Benediction while the subtler fragrance of the incense lingered
through the church, and the windows blazed their illuminated
suggestions of sacrifice and worship. As the dazed disciple said, it
‘seemed good to be there.’”
This hap-hazard reportorial encounter described correctly the feeling
created in the gigantic multitude that thronged the edifice. And all
this was followed by a most beautifully conceived Bull, issued from
Staten Island which, as with the finger of an act of transfiguration
rooted the Pope and the _Idea of the Pope forever_ in the New World.
And then rising with thrills and transports of pleasure from one
surprise to another, the staring populace of the great City-State
were invited to consider the marriage of Helen Lorimer to Rudolpho
Amato, celebrated by this same democratic and transported Pope. It
was a climax. It came at a moment of precise effectiveness. Never had
Miss Lorimer risen to a higher power for good than since the Mayor’s
death, and the end of the unsuccessful socialistic revolution. We
have already seen how her own class struggled—and honestly—to create
a beneficent and democratic aristocracy in the state. This was
continued. It was one of the dearest dreams of Helen herself. She
arranged and animated its advances. Her action in the defense of the
suspected but innocent men, caught at the fire of her Settlement
House, had given to her a renewed and an almost impregnable
popularity and vogue. And this was supplemented and augmented by
the splendid gift to the City of her completed Museum—completed
one year after the death of the Mayor, and on the anniversary of
the insurrection. The New Museum was placed exactly where the old
Settlement House had been.
It was a square building with a flat roof, and possessed seven
stories. The roof was fitted out for recreation, and its height
supplied a healthful and cool resort in the hot summer months; the
two floors below it were kept for meetings, classes, libraries,
and a _creche_ for working mothers. The remaining floors held the
Museum, and it was developed in the line of Helen’s own explanations
to the Mayor, in that first night of their meeting at her home. It
was an objectified Gazetteer, with more history, and more allusion,
and a mild didacticism interwoven. Civilizations were depicted, and
contrasted, and much of their forlornness was not forgotten, the
lesson of progressive betterments being shown, and that gradual
emancipation of the race from a debased selfishness, but the growth
of all such altruism was regarded—a little narrowly—as the fruit of
Christianity.
On that score Miss Lorimer would abate nothing. It was an unique and
most original spot, and so well imagined to combine pleasure, and
usefulness, and instruction, and help—for in its lower basement it
had a dispensatory—that it was instantly thronged. But Miss Lorimer
intended to attach to it a proprietary interest. No one could enter
it and use it but the Members of the Order Club. Everyone could
belong to this club, but its membership came under the scrutiny of
its directors, and they were elected. Every head of a Household paid
five cents a month for his family, and all others one cent. The
scheme worked well, and the people took a pride in it, and in their
memberships. Miss Lorimer endowed it, and put well paid curators in
it as well. Its expansion was further provided for.
It was the night before their wedding that Amato and Helen were
together in the great library of her home. The winter cold had
hastened somewhat, and the fireplace was filled with flaring logs.
They had been sitting together in front of this cheerful light. Helen
sat forward on her chair her face resting in her hands while her
arms rested on her knees and she looked into the ranked and flaming
wood-pile. Amato leaned far back in his chair and his eyes were on
her alone, their rapt and happy gaze changing at intervals into
brief smiles that parted the curved lips and made him more handsome.
For never had that extreme physical charm seemed fairer to him than
to-night. Helen had only just turned her bewildered glance from his
compelling beauty, as if she fled from its overpowering tyranny.
Amato was perhaps half conscious of his control, and that brought
into his eyes the rising and vanishing smile. But his slavery to the
beautiful woman was abject. There may have been just then the sense
of a vanquishing power which maintained his freedom and his mastery;
but in his heart he knew the relentless passion that desired and yet,
through the benignity of his mind’s higher insight, feared.
“Helen, can you see the future in those blazing embers? Tea-leaves
are better accredited among the sybils.” The voice was half mocking.
Helen laughed a little, and without turning to her companion
answered: “Sometimes I wonder whether we can give inanimate
things—when they are not altogether stocks and stones—some power born
of ourselves to tell us what we wish to know. Surely those burning
motes filled with fire, all their parts vibrating with motion, down
to their last atoms, might now be ready to respond to the tyrannous
demands of our souls.”
“But how will they answer?” the voice now betrayed some interest.
“Why, by pictures. They have no other power. We ourselves are the
Seers and we catch in them thrown outwards from our own divinations
the images of the things to come.”
“Like the Pythagorean who by looking formed the clay after the image
of his thought, or those less recondite magicians who tell your
fortune by a crystal sphere.”
“Ah! Rudolph you must not trifle; the pictures are symbols and they
are allusions only—not photographs of what you and I will do—” she
rose from her stooping position and laid her hand upon his, still
regarding the crumbling and reforming mirages of the fire;—“but
types, as now a flame, and now a star, and now the—Yes I see it—the
Cross—”.
“Helen are you one who ‘looks into the seeds of time and tells which
grain will grow and which will not?’”
“Why Rudolph, it sometimes seems to me as if our souls left us, were
like sensitive glasses feeling the approaching years with what they
hold, as the barometer, long before the storm or the fair weather,
falls or rises, responding so minutely to the changing pressure
around it.”
“O Love could you and I with fate conspire
To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire,
Would not we shatter it to bits—and then
Remould it nearer to the heart’s desire?”
Amato leaned forward as he repeated the smooth lines, with his
voice tuned to the depth of his devotion for this woman, leaned
so far forward indeed that his cheek brushed against her own, and
then his hand was lifted and rested on her shoulder. She turned,
he slid forward to his knees on the floor before her. Their faces
were opposite each other, their eyes met, and then—almost with
violence—Amato leaped to his feet seized her hands, drew her up to
himself and crushed her lips with his own. She was plastic in his
arms, but there was no return of his frantic pressure.
He slowly relinquished his constraint, and a sudden pain wrote itself
in his face—it almost again seemed to him that that invisible
partition of the dead man’s memory yet divided them, very slightly
perhaps, but Love is so imperious, that the thought stabbed him like
a knife and Helen understood. She saw his pain—her words came to his
ears like music—such sweet blissful assurance—and yet—;
“No! No! Amato I love you—there is no reservation—” her voice
faltered, and tears sprang into her eyes: “We shall be happy—we shall
work—the greatness of human destiny will be for us a watchword for
endeavor—for all sorts of noble enterprises—”
It was her turn to rouse him—he stood looking at her wistfully,
thankfully—but somehow that deep egotism of the true lover craved
some greater personal surrender—Why now should designs of Work hide
HIM from her—was there not Love—Possession—at least for a little
while; let all else be forgotten, and the one personal act of Union
reign supreme.
He dropped her hands and laughed bitterly.
“Ah Helen—ever Work! Cannot I count for something?” the laugh
vanished—that tender boyish smile, so beguiling and winning came
into his eyes and his mouth parted. Helen Lorimer saw it all now—and
the revelation, pointing so deeply to the unsatisfied longing,
the quenchless thirst for surrender and temporal oblivion, lit up
within her a strange wonderful delight. She flung her arms about
Amato’s neck, she nestled her head upon his shoulder, she sought
his mouth with her lips, and in the flood—the tide running fast and
unrestrained—of joy, as if a touch had liberated imprisoned waters,
the two lost all reference to the Future—one abounding, mastering,
remorselessly ecstatic PRESENT held them wedded in mind, in heart, in
soul.
Six months later an official ceremony sealed this voiceless pact.
It was a glorious wedding. Such a nuptial splendor had never before
been seen in New York. Cardinal Fenton intended that it should be
made tributary to his own designs; it certainly accentuated again
the fact of the new Presence in America—the Pope’s. It was held at
dawn. The long procession of carriages from Carrara was resplendently
conceived. They were lit with oil torches, and, along the avenues
they passed, arches of lights and welcoming discharges of rockets
administered a civic public note that was unmistakable. Agreeable
to Helen Lorimer’s orders largess, in forms of banquets, gifts and
endowments had incorporated the whole great city in this noble
function. The Cathedral of St. Patrick’s was encrusted with light,
from arch and fret and angle the electric coronas sent their rays,
and at its entrance the Pope’s Arms deftly interwoven with the Eagle
and the Flag of the States surmounted a flashing arch of lights,
and, more ominously to some, above these shone the escutcheon of the
City-State.
Within the sacred structure the spectacle was a ravishing picture
of color and coruscation. Climbing coils of light terminating in
pendent colored globes, lined the central aisle, the altar dressed
to its very summit with roses sparkled also with lights; enormous
candles burned within the sanctuary, the thrones of the Pope and the
Cardinal were opposite each other and each was a hill of lilies.
The Pope celebrated the Nuptial Mass and awaited at the altar the
slow progress of the bridal procession which was itself a vision of
beauty. Priests and acolytes, in swaying groups surrounded the Pope
and the Cardinal.
Helen had wished to embody again her generous emotions in this
great act of her life. One of the lovely and touching features of
the bridal train was the presence of fifty little girls from the
East Side, and as many boys carrying chains of flowers, chosen
protegees from her many foundations of charity. In the centre of
this escort Helen, with her twelve bridesmaids, accompanied only by
her Mother Julieta, approached. Rudolph awaited her at the steps of
the Communion Rail supported by his company of groomsmen, while
through the huge temple of worship the music and the chorus of the
Lohengrün Wedding March breathed its festive melodies. The curious
archaic custom of enclosing the bride and bridegroom in the nuptial
cloth was observed, and when at last the rite was consummated the
blessing given by the transported Pope, the recessional begun to the
accompaniment of a full orchestra playing Mendelssohn’s Spring Song,
while three thousand guests watched and wondered—it truly seemed as
if the Great City was about to enter itself upon some new chapter of
development wherein should be seen again, in closer conflict, the
allied strength of Helen Lorimer’s beneficent Democracy of Wealth
and the Hierarchy of the Church, against the Lust of Life and the
disintegrating agitations of Socialism.
Was it auspicious that as Rudolph assisted Helen, and her Mother, to
the equipage, of which he was now an occupant, that the risen Sun of
the May morning shone brightly, and that throngs in the streets burst
into cheers?
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE
Inconsistent punctuation has been left unchanged while typographical
errors, hyphenation inconsistencies and numerous spelling errors have
been silently corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences
within the text and consultation of external sources.
Except for those changes noted below archaic usage has been retained.
Page 28 “it was called—the region-Carrara” changed to “it was
called—the region—Carrara”
Page 213 “It was a pet theory of the Cardinals” changed to “It was
a pet theory of the Cardinal’s”
*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MAYOR OF NEW YORK ***
Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will
be renamed.
Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright
law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works,
so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United
States without permission and without paying copyright
royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part
of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project
Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™
concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark,
and may not be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following
the terms of the trademark license, including paying royalties for use
of the Project Gutenberg trademark. If you do not charge anything for
copies of this eBook, complying with the trademark license is very
easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation
of derivative works, reports, performances and research. Project
Gutenberg eBooks may be modified and printed and given away—you may
do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks not protected
by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the trademark
license, especially commercial redistribution.
START: FULL LICENSE
THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG™ LICENSE
PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
To protect the Project Gutenberg™ mission of promoting the free
distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full
Project Gutenberg License available with this file or online at
www.gutenberg.org/license.
Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg
electronic works
1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg
electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all
the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or
destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg electronic works in your
possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a
Project Gutenberg electronic work and you do not agree to be bound
by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person
or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be
used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few
things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg electronic works
even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See
paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project
Gutenberg electronic works if you follow the terms of this
agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg
electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below.
1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the
Foundation” or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection
of Project Gutenberg electronic works. Nearly all the individual
works in the collection are in the public domain in the United
States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the
United States and you are located in the United States, we do not
claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing,
displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as
all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope
that you will support the Project Gutenberg mission of promoting
free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg
works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the
Project Gutenberg name associated with the work. You can easily
comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the
same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg License when
you share it without charge with others.
1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are
in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States,
check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this
agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing,
distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any
other Project Gutenberg work. The Foundation makes no
representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any
country other than the United States.
1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other
immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg License must appear
prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg work (any work
on which the phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the
phrase “Project Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed,
performed, viewed, copied or distributed:
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg™ License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you
are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws
of the country where you are located before using this eBook.
1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is
derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not
contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the
copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in
the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are
redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply
either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or
obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg
trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is posted
with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any
additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms
will be linked to the Project Gutenberg License for all works
posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the
beginning of this work.
1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg
License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg.
1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
Gutenberg License.
1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including
any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access
to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg work in a format
other than “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official
version posted on the official Project Gutenberg website
(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means
of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original “Plain
Vanilla ASCII” or other form. Any alternate format must include the
full Project Gutenberg License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg works
unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
access to or distributing Project Gutenberg electronic works
provided that:
• You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
the use of Project Gutenberg works calculated using the method
you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed
to the owner of the Project Gutenberg trademark, but he has
agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid
within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are
legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty
payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in
Section 4, “Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation.”
• You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg™
License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all
copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue
all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg™
works.
• You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of
any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
receipt of the work.
• You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
distribution of Project Gutenberg™ works.
1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work or group of works on different terms than
are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing
from the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the manager of
the Project Gutenberg™ trademark. Contact the Foundation as set
forth in Section 3 below.
1.F.
1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project
Gutenberg™ collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may
contain “Defects,” such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate
or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or
other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or
cannot be read by your equipment.
1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the “Right
of Replacement or Refund” described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
Gutenberg™ trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
DAMAGE.
1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you
received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium
with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you
with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in
lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person
or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second
opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If
the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing
without further opportunities to fix the problem.
1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you ‘AS-IS’, WITH NO
OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT
LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of
damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement
violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the
agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or
limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or
unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the
remaining provisions.
1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
providing copies of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works in
accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the
production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses,
including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of
the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this
or any Project Gutenberg work, (b) alteration, modification, or
additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg work, and (c) any
Defect you cause.
Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg is synonymous with the free distribution of
electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of
computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It
exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations
from people in all walks of life.
Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg’s
goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg collection will
remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
and permanent future for Project Gutenberg and future
generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see
Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at www.gutenberg.org.
Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non-profit
501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
Revenue Service. The Foundation’s EIN or federal tax identification
number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by
U.S. federal laws and your state’s laws.
The Foundation’s business office is located at 41 Watchung Plaza #516,
Montclair NJ 07042, USA, +1 (862) 621-9288. Email contact links and up
to date contact information can be found at the Foundation’s website
and official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact
Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation
Project Gutenberg™ depends upon and cannot survive without widespread
public support and donations to carry out its mission of
increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
freely distributed in machine-readable form accessible by the widest
array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations
($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
status with the IRS.
The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations
where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular state
visit www.gutenberg.org/donate.
While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
approach us with offers to donate.
International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
Please check the Project Gutenberg web pages for current donation
methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other
ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To
donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate.
Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg electronic works
Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project
Gutenberg concept of a library of electronic works that could be
freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and
distributed Project Gutenberg eBooks with only a loose network of
volunteer support.
Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed
editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in
the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not
necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper
edition.
Most people start at our website which has the main PG search
facility: www.gutenberg.org.
This website includes information about Project Gutenberg,
including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
