CHAPTER VHYPNOTISM USED FOR AN ANÆSTHETIC
Mrs. Ramsey and Miss Holland emerged from the dressing-rooms after a trifling delay, and found Hilda's party and Dr. Morris waiting in the foyer. Just as they were about making their way to their respective motors they heard a sudden commotion and wild cries from the street, and a crowd of people surged in, crying that a child had been killed by an automobile. Both Dr. Earl and Dr. Morris rushed toward the street as a man came in carrying a little girl of perhaps ten years of age, bleeding profusely from the mouth and the scalp, with one leg evidently broken. The mother of the child, a comely woman of thirty, followed, wringing her hands. Her excitement verged on hysteria, but at the sight of Dr. Morris she controlled herself by a mighty effort.
"To the hospital, to the hospital, Dr. Earl," peremptorily exclaimed Dr. Morris, as Dr.Earl threw aside his coat and, rolling back his sleeves and directing the man to place the child on a table in one of the ante-rooms, began to examine the character of the injuries.
"Oh, don't take my poor child to the hospital. I know she will die if she goes there; bring her home; it is only a few blocks," the mother pleaded with Dr. Morris, whom she seemed to know.
"Don't waste time here. Where is the telephone? I will call an ambulance immediately."
"I don't want her taken to the hospital," said the woman sullenly.
"This is no place to operate on a hysterical child," Morris answered. "She need not be kept in the hospital, but she should certainly be taken there. I know Dr. Earl will agree with me."
In the meantime, Earl had completed his examination. Silvia Holland was watching him anxiously. As Morris spoke he looked up and caught her eye.
"It is only a simple fracture, and the scalp wounds are slight. I suppose we could get along, if we can get hot water and the necessary appliances," he said dubiously, and then added, turning to the woman, "Dr. Morris is quiteright, madame, in advising the hospital, and I assure you there is no danger."
The woman turned pleading eyes to Silvia. "She's all I have, and I can't let her be taken away from me. Couldn't we go home? It is only a few blocks away, and I know I can make her comfortable. Oh, please, please don't let them take her away!"
Miss Holland looked at Dr. Earl and put her arm around the woman protectingly. "If it isn't any worse than that," she said hesitatingly, "don't you think you could do as she asks? Setting a simple fracture isn't a very complicated operation, is it?"
Earl smiled. "Oh, no," he said, "it can be done in a comparatively few minutes."
"Then why not do it," she said, "and spare the mother all this protracted agony, and get the child home?"
"Because there are no appliances here to administer an anæsthetic or do anything else properly," answered Morris impatiently, "and no one can tell from a cursory examination whether or not there are other injuries, to say nothing of the danger from septicæmia if the work is done in a clumsy, slipshod manner."
Earl colored, and Miss Holland replied withsome spirit that even the absence of the usual accessories need not imply clumsiness of method, and again asked Earl if he could not manage where they were. He turned to the mother.
"If you insist upon it, I have no doubt that I can do all that is necessary without bad results. As to the anæsthetic, we can dispense with that."
"I will have nothing to do with the case under these circumstances," Morris said angrily.
The woman hesitated, and then said firmly, "I should prefer the other gentleman to take charge. I won't have her taken to the hospital."
"Very well," said Earl, and taking a notebook from his pocket he wrote out a list of necessary appliances, bandages, alcohol, antiseptic solutions, surgeon's scissors, needles, silk and thread, and giving it to Frank bade him hurry to the drug-store around the corner which carried surgical supplies and procure them, and also to bring a box that would do for splints.
"I must have an assistant," he said, and without a word, Miss Holland improvised an apron from some of the bunting thatwas in evidence everywhere, and put herself at his disposal. He sent all the others out of the room, and bent over the child for a few minutes. What did he do? Miss Holland watched, but could not tell. The moaning ceased, the little limbs relaxed, and the child fell into a quiet sleep.
The mother stood just outside the door, listening with strained attention, and after two or three impatient turns about the foyer, Morris joined her.
"You can do as you please so far as I am concerned," he said in a low tone, "but I warn you that you are taking big risks. Allie is nervous and excitable at any time, and to-night she is close to hysterics, and she won't get over the shock of even a simple operation in a hurry, especially if he is fool enough to attempt it without an anæsthetic."
The woman wavered for a moment, and then turned away without a word, and shrugging his shoulders Morris strode down toward the entrance. A moment later Silvia Holland came out of the ante-room.
"You can go in now," she said, "only don't disturb your child; she is sleeping and you mustbe very quiet. Did you see Dr. Morris? Oh, there he is."
Mindful of the amenities of life, she hurried to his side. His face was dark with something more than anger, and did not lighten as she laid the tips of her fingers on his arm.
"I know you will excuse me, Orrin," she said gently. "You mustn't be angry with me, but I really feel as if I ought to see this through; the poor woman needs me. You will forgive me?"
He looked at her with sudden passion. "Oh, yes, I forgiveyou," he said, with unmistakable emphasis on the pronoun, and was gone. Silvia Holland looked after him for a moment, conscious that, accustomed as she was to his moods, this was quite a new one, and then joined Dr. Earl, who had come into the foyer to say goodnight to the Ramseys and Frank Earl, who had returned with the surgical appliances and found nothing more that he could do. "By the way, old man," Dr. Earl called to his brother-in-law, "send the machine back if you don't mind," and with a word of thanks he re-entered the ante-room, followed by Miss Holland, and closed the door against further interruption.
There was a sink in the room, with hot andcold water, and he directed Miss Holland to cleanse the basin and implements in the boiling water, and follow this up by dipping them in an antiseptic solution; in the meantime he ripped the box to pieces, and selected two strips, which he whittled into splints, shaping them to the child's leg, and working with great rapidity. The bandages, cotton and other things were laid out upon the table, and then he took the basin and a cloth and washed the wounds on the head, putting back the tousled locks as carefully and tenderly as a woman.
"Ordinarily," he said to his assistant, "I should have done this first, but my examination showed that this injury is very slight. Of course she has bled profusely, but it has come from the nose, and it looks pretty bad, but there is nothing serious. Half a dozen stitches will be ample for the scalp. Thread that needle with the silk, please. Now let me have it." He took it from her, and in a moment the cuts on the head were sewed, and he was pulling the leg into place, applying the cotton, the splints and bandages, working deftly and silently. "The other needle with the thread, please," he said, not looking up, and Miss Hollandhanded it to him. Presently he raised his head and threw back his shoulders.
"It is all done," he said simply, and called the mother. "I shall return in a quarter of an hour," he said, "and bring her out of this sleep. Do not try to rouse her, for you cannot. Do you not think, Miss Holland, that it would be well for me to get a nurse to assist in taking the little one home? I can 'phone when I return these instruments."
"Your machine is coming back, isn't it?" Miss Holland answered. "It seems to me that with what help her mother and I can render that we shall manage."
"Excellently," he said. "Then you will be on guard until my return; see that the child is not disturbed. I shall be gone but a few minutes."
He readjusted his attire, and taking up his hat strode out of the building, unconscious until he reached the door that half a dozen energetic reporters were eagerly asking particulars. Finding him unwilling to tell them anything more than the vaguest generalities, the more resourceful returned to the improvised operating-room, and before Silvia Holland knew it theyhad the story from her enthusiastic lips, supplemented by a few facts gathered from the woman. For thus are first-page sensations secured and created.
Silvia noticed that the woman spoke with visible reluctance, and she herself passed over the controversy between Dr. Morris and Dr. Earl, anxious to spare her friend any unnecessary annoyance.
"I am sorry, Mrs. Bell," she said contritely. "I didn't realize at first that we were being interviewed."
"Oh, there is no harm done," the woman said quietly. "I hope the doctor will not mind; won't he be back pretty soon?"
Almost as she spoke, his tall form was seen making its way through the besieging ranks of the Fourth Estate. He waved them aside good humoredly, but refusing to be interviewed, he took the child in his strong arms and, followed by her mother and Miss Holland, made his way to the auto. While she was in a profound sleep when he returned, she wakened instantly when he commanded her to do so, and the cool night air evidently refreshed her greatly as they drove to Mrs. Bell's home. Dr. Earl carriedthe little one upstairs, gave her mother explicit directions, and promising to call early the following day to adjust a cast, left the apartment with Miss Holland.
CHAPTER VISOME STRENUOUS ANTI-SUFFRAGISTS
Several of the New York papers carried lurid headlines and more or less sensational accounts of the accident to the child and the treatment administered by Dr. Earl, as well as a tribute to the heroism of the volunteer nurse. All of them contained a report of some character of these occurrences.
When Dr. Earl called at the home of his fiancée, according to appointment, to take her and her mother to luncheon the next day, he found Leonora in a sullen mood, and it did not take him long to discover that he was not in high favor at this particular hour.
He greeted her with a kiss, but hers in return was perfunctory. He was not compelled to wait long for an explanation, for she poured out her feelings without any questioning.
"Oh, Jack, dear, how could you mix up with that suffrage crowd! Don't you know thatmamma is vice-president of the Anti-Woman Suffrage League? She is so annoyed! And that horrid Silvia Holland—why, Jack, she is a downright socialist. Don't you know she was arrested in England for trying to break into parliament with a lot of other suffragettes, and she was arrested here only last month for defying the police and taking sides with a lot of girls who refused to work in the factories where they were employed! Even when in school she was horrid. When they wouldn't let her make a suffrage speech on the school grounds one night she took the girls to a neighboring graveyard and spoke from a flat monument! And to think the papers have you mixed up with her, and our wedding soon to be announced! Oh, it's terrible!" and she buried her face in the sofa pillows.
Had this scene occurred with any one else, Jack felt certain he could not have restrained his laughter, for he could see Miss Holland delivering an exhortation to the schoolgirls from a tombstone in a cemetery by night. But he understood the prejudices of a certain element of New York society, and while the past twenty-four hours had led him, somewhat, to believe that this progressive democratic wavesweeping over the world had engulfed all New Yorkers, he now realized how sadly mistaken he had been.
With infinite tact he told her that his sister had taken their party to the ball—pointed out his own duty when the injured child had been brought in from the street, and how he had not even suggested that Miss Holland should assist him. He saw that the present was no time for a discussion of the merits of the case or a pronouncement of his own views, but he distinctly realized, with something of a jolt, it is true, that a wide gulf separated the Bourbon element of America's supposed democracy from the advancing column of her real and inspired democracy, and he wondered whether it were at all possible to tunnel under or bridge over this gulf. He lightly changed the subject.
"I have just discovered that I can get my old offices on East 53rd Street, as the year's lease expires the first of next month, and the agents heeded my letter asking them to wait for me. So I shall feel quite at home in the old quarters," he said.
She smiled at this, but was not quite ready to drop the former subject. "Jack, dear, didyou take Miss Holland home at one o'clock in the morning?"
He laughed at her this time, as he bent to kiss her. "I really believe you are jealous, you little nymph. Of course I took her home. She could not stay there all night, and there was no one else to take her."
She looked very serious. "No, I don't know what jealousy is," she slowly and emphatically said, "but I don't want to know people who do the things that Miss Holland does, and I don't want you to know them."
"My dear child," he said, taking her hands in his and catching her eyes with his own steady glance. "I must know whoever is thrown into my path either in a professional or a social way. All people are intensely interesting to me, for we are, after all, but one great family of human beings, trying to carve out lives that are worth while, and this we can do better by getting the best there is from each other." He hesitated a moment, still looking steadily at her. She quivered slightly, but he was dimly conscious of the colossal character of the will she was summoning to her aid. Then very slowly, but with all the earnestness of his nature, he added, "You must get away from these views, for theyare dwarfing and not becoming to you, and if you do not we shall be very unhappy. Miss Holland is a remarkable young woman. She is destined to fill a great place in our American social and political life. She is well worthy of your friendship."
She withdrew her hands, but still kept her eyes fixed on his. Her brow contracted and with emphasis she said: "Miss Holland has forfeited her place in our set by her conduct; why, Jack, you don't know how she is criticized by our friends or you would not suggest such a thing."
He arose with a shrug of his shoulders. Fortunately, Mrs. Kimball appeared at this moment and they motored to the Plaza for luncheon, which was a somewhat formal and unsatisfactory affair, in spite of all his efforts to make it otherwise. The young man could not but feel that Mrs. Kimball shared her daughter's views—was, in fact, their author—and that in the eyes of his future mother-in-law he had been guilty of a breach of etiquette far more serious than an infraction of the moral law. He left them with the understanding that he would accompany them to the theatre in the evening.
CHAPTER VIICHRISTIAN SCIENCE AND SURGERY
The days of a militant suffragette are full to overflowing, and Silvia Holland was not able to see Mrs. Bell and her little daughter early the following morning as she had planned. It must have been well toward the middle of the afternoon when she entered the modest apartment, and going to the bed, visible in the alcove, kissed the child and put a great, dewy bunch of violets in her hand. She took them, and hugged them tight in her thin little arms, while her eyes looked into Silvia's wonderingly, and her mother turned away to hide the sudden tears.
The apartment was well though not expensively furnished, and both mother and child had the unmistakable air of good birth and refinement. As Silvia glanced at Mrs. Bell she was conscious of something in her face at once baffling and appealing. She had the indefinablelook of one who dwells with a sorrow for which there is no cure.
"Are you quite sure there is nothing I can do for either of you to-day?" Silvia asked, a trifle diffidently, for she did not want to offend by overzeal.
"You and Dr. Earl have placed us under so many obligations that we can never hope to repay them," Mrs. Bell said quietly. "If I do not speak more freely of what I feel, it is because I have no words for its expression."
"Don't speak or think of obligations," Silvia said lightly, "and here is my card, so that if at any time I might be of service to you I hope you will not hesitate to call on me. I live at the Whittier Studios." The card which she gave Mrs. Bell read:
Silvia Holland,Attorney and Counsellor-at-Law,City Investment Building,New York City.
Mrs. Bell looked at it curiously. "Oh, it isn't possible that you arethatMiss Holland,theMiss Holland!" she said incredulously.
Silvia laughed. "Don't I look as if I could say 'Gentlemen of the jury' with sufficientgravity?" she said. "Probably I shall do better when we say 'Ladies of the jury,' too."
"You look like what you are, a beautiful and fashionable lady," Mrs. Bell answered. "Surely no one would ever take you for a professional woman."
"Must a fashionable lady be a listless parasite? Even if she wishes merely to be a queen of society, would she not be more queenly if she knew the trials and afflictions of others, and, better still, knew how to help them? Would she be less a queen if she were not dependent upon some man for her daily bread——"
A sudden flash of something, she could not tell whether it was pain or rebellion or despair, crossed Mrs. Bell's face, and Silvia hesitated and then went on rather hurriedly, as if, knowing she had struck a false note, she sought to distract the other woman's thought from it. "I am trying to demonstrate the glorious mission that belongs to woman when she fills her predestined sphere of economic independence and political freedom."
"Political freedom will come first and easiest," said the woman slowly. She raised her eyes, filled with trouble, and looked full into Silvia's. "The other is the greater boon, andwill be harder to win. Some day I may need to consult a lawyer; there is no one I would so gladly trust; it is a personal matter and may adjust itself, if not——"
"If not, telephone to make sure that I am in, and I shall be glad to see you at any time," answered Silvia.
There was the sound of a quick, firm step in the hall, and the bell rang. Mrs. Bell opened the door and admitted Dr. Earl. After a few questions and the exchange of greetings, he went over to the bedside of his small patient. He found the child doing admirably, and glanced hastily about the room, trying to make up his mind whether he might offer any other assistance than that of a professional character. He decided that he could not, and realized with a sense of pleasure and relief that Miss Holland would be able to attend to such details with more tact and skill than he could. Nor could he help the glow of gratification that they should be associated in so vital a matter, one that he felt swept away the petty conventionalities of society, and placed them on a footing of understanding and common sympathy not to have been acquired by months, or even years, of the ordinary social amenities. After a fewdirections for the care of the small patient, and a promise to look in the following day, he told Mrs. Bell how to find him in case of any sudden need and took up his hat and stick.
"Were you going, Dr. Earl? Can I set you down anywhere? My car is at the door."
He bowed, and followed her out. "We have an embarrassment of riches," he said, "for my car is also here." Then, rather boyishly, moved by an impulse he would have found it hard to explain, he said, "Suppose we dismiss them both, and walk up through the Park?"
She acquiesced, and a few moments later they were strolling up the Avenue, rather silently, considering that each had many things to say. As usual, it was the woman who broke the silence.
"Tell me about all this. I never was more interested in anything in my life," she said, looking up at him with a glance that carried the subtlest flattery, and, while her query was vague, he understood and made no attempt to evade it.
"It is a long story," he said; "have you time for it to-day? And it is really no more remarkable than the effect you produced in your parade yesterday, and I think the causes arethe same. The world is full of mystery, but before honest, earnest purpose of any kind the storehouses of mystery will eventually open. The fact is, that the present tremendous progressive movement in the world is spiritual and every phase of it is interdependent upon every other element. The thoughtless call these things 'fads.' In reality, each one of them marks a crystallization of centuries of thought and hope and dream for the advancement and elevation of the human race. The world, as usually happens in spiritual matters, awakened to the importance of all of them at the same time." He paused, as if realizing for the first time how personal was the story for which she had asked. "You will think me an egregious egotist, Miss Holland, I fear."
"No, whatever you may be, or I may think you, you need have no fears on that score." She answered simply, directly. "Please tell me—if you think I deserve so great a confidence."
He bowed gravely; there was no hint of coquetry in her manner.
"Directly after my graduation at Harvard, three years ago, I opened offices in New York, intending to specialize in surgery, for I hadprepared for that, though I desired to obtain a general practice for a while to put into effect and improve my theoretical knowledge. In a misty way I soon realized that neither my own efforts nor those of my colleagues were crowned with the success that should attend a profession founded upon strictly scientific principles, as modern surgery is. The chief cause of disturbance with me was that so many operations were performed which subsequent developments showed might have been avoided, but which at the time seemed imperative. I redoubled my studies ofmateria medica, hoping to find a way by which this difficulty might be obviated or overcome, and while my constant researches helped, I still found much difficulty in arriving at accurate conclusions before attempting an operation. I found nothing that satisfied me. I was also greatly bothered and baffled by the large number of cases which the surgeon encounters, controlled or dependent upon nervous conditions and the futility of the drugs ordinarily given.
"While in this mood a friend of mine called at my office one Wednesday evening by appointment. He was the general manager of a large utility company that has to do with thepeople of every section of the civilized world, and a man of rare judgment, knowledge of the world, and poise. We were on most intimate terms, and I had already told him something of these perplexities. This evening, I had supposed that he was coming to see me professionally, and I had made other engagements. As soon as he stepped into my private office, he said: 'Doctor, cancel every engagement you have for this evening. I need you very badly in affairs of my own. You are to ask no questions, but do as I request and send me your bill to-morrow.'
"Of course I could not refuse him, so I arranged to go with him, and then asked whether I should require surgical instruments or only a medicine case. He replied that I would need neither, and I could gain nothing from his manner, for he was very grave. At his suggestion we walked, going up Fifth Avenue to the Park, and then across the Park to the corner of 96th Street and Central Park West, where there stands a great church. The rolling notes of the organ filled the quiet with an impressiveness I had never felt before, and the congregation was singing an old hymn with an earnestness and depth of feeling quite differentfrom most congregational singing. We entered and were shown to seats in the balcony, in the front row, where we had an excellent view of most of those below. 'You will find many of your acquaintances here,' he said, and on looking around I was surprised at the great number of prominent New York men and women in the audience.
"After the preliminary proceedings those that desired to do so were invited to tell their experiences in combating disease, or other adverse conditions. What I heard was a revelation. This experience, corroborating, as it did, my own observations, emphasized how little of the field of suggestive and mental therapeutics the ordinary medical practitioner really filled, and I determined to explore that field before going any further with my practice. I thanked my friend for taking me to this place, and within a month I decided to go abroad. I visited the institutions of note in Europe, where suggestive therapeutics are practiced, and then went to India, where I spent many months. There I found the original source of suggestive, mental and spiritual treatment.
"If the Yogi of India could supplement his method of training the subconscious mind withthe knowledge which our regular physicians possess, and could apply both with discriminating skill, we would have the greatest human healing power ever known. The best I could hope for was to apply as much of the wisdom of the Yogi and other cults in India and Europe as I could master in the brief time at my disposal, and that I am attempting to do. With all the perfection of system in training the subconscious mind that characterizes a comparatively few of the inhabitants of India, the millions are left without any appreciable benefits therefrom, just as the millions here are left without the full benefits of the special training of the few.
"We are but touching the borderland of this mysterious realm of the occult, the subconscious and the spiritual forces that have such an important bearing upon all phases of human life, and which, when intelligently applied to the child in school and the direction of the individual in his career, promise so much for the elevation, longevity and achievements of the human race.
"The world is just waking up to the vast significance of the spiritual teachings of Jesus Christ, and their bearing upon all phases andactivities of human life. When Christ told the Pharisees that 'the kingdom of God is within you,' he carried the lesson, though little understood then, and so fully comprehended now, that Christianity, citizenship, government, health, happiness and progress are all dependent upon the character of the ideals and purposes and daily life of the individual.
"When Christ told the lawyer that to 'love thy neighbor as thyself' was one of the essentials of salvation, he laid the corner-stone for a pure and honest democracy, without which underlying principle there can be no lasting democratic government. We now know, in medicine, that much of longevity and good health and power of recuperation depend upon the ideals of the individual, and their inspiring influence.
"It is too bad that with all our tremendous progress we allow bigotry and prejudice to hamper us in getting the most out of the wisdom around us as well as that of the ages, all of which is correlated. Yet very often the orthodox Christian, who believes that Christ not only healed the sick but also raised the dead, decries the Christian Scientist who only professes to restore the sick on the theory that diseasecannot exist in an individual properly imbued with Christ's teachings. Too often the orthodox doctor of medicine denounces the healer who overcomes apparent disease through mental suggestion or arrests a nervous breakdown in a patient by teaching that patient how to relax, when the doctor himself does not hesitate to give bread pills in the first instance and to recommend a sanitarium where relaxation is the only thing attempted in the second. And I presume this quotation from the Dhamma-pada, which is many centuries older than the Christian religion, would be denounced as heresy by some of the Christian Scientists, although it embodies the spirit and almost the words of their own teachings: 'All that we are is the result of what we have thought. It is founded on our thoughts; it is made up of our thoughts. If a man speak or act with an evil thought, pain follows him as the wheel follows the foot of the ox that draws the carriage.'"
Presently Dr. Earl hailed a passing taxi-cab, and gave the order to be taken to the Whittier Studios. The drive home was silent. Once or twice Silvia looked at her tall companion. She was frankly curious about the Paris case,but something in the quiet, self-contained face of the man beside her did not invite questions. On his part, John Earl was asking himself why he should have given his confidence to this comparative stranger, and the longer he thought about it the less able was he to answer his question.
CHAPTER VIIITHE OMNIPRESENT EYES OF FIFTH AVENUE
The source of gossip in a village is the corner grocery store; in a small city, what goes on about the public square; in the medium-sized city, what transpires in the leading café; in New York, Fifth Avenue and Central Park are the all-abounding sources of gossip. The Avenue has a thousand curious eyes; those on the sidewalk peering into automobiles and carriages for sensations; those being whirled along in vehicles, straining their power in the quest of salacious information among the throng beyond the curbstone. All New York passes along Fifth Avenue at some time or another. All of one's friends are always passing along that way when one does not particularly wish to be seen by them. If one is walking, the friends are invariably driving; if one is driving, of course the ubiquitous acquaintancesare out for a stroll. Sometimes people have been known to escape two-thirds of the omnipresent eyes that line the sidewalks, pack the Avenue and infest the highways of Central Park, but no person has ever been heard of who escaped all of them.
So the lot of our strollers was but the common lot of all, visitors as well as resident New Yorkers.
While mutually absorbed, the one in reciting the tale, the other in listening to it; while diverted and interested by the thousand sparks that radiate from the batteries of youthful energy and enthusiasm and tingle the sensibilities of a congenial comrade; while speculating on the unknown vista from peep-holes that show only fragments, but realizing all the vastness and richness of the world force and universal sympathy possessed by each of them—it is not strange that in four blocks on the Avenue they were passed by two ladies in an automobile, who took more than an ordinary interest in their movements, and by a dark-eyed, dark-haired man in another car, whose eyes gleamed and whose cheeks blanched at the sight of their absorption in each other.
But the things garnered on the Avenue arenever placed in cold storage, and soon enough both of them were to hear about this stroll.
When Dr. Earl called that evening to take Mrs. and Miss Kimball to the theatre he discovered that his reception in the morning had been tropical compared to this one. He was compelled to wait fully fifteen minutes before Miss Kimball appeared in house gown and slippers, indicating her purpose to remain at home, and the bearer of a message that her mother begged to be excused, as she had retired with a sick headache.
In vain he sought for a reason for his frigid reception, and feeling that his presence was an affliction he arose to go.
"I hope you had a pleasant stroll this afternoon," came in icicle tones.
This shed all the light necessary upon the character of his greeting.
The eyes of Fifth Avenue had not grown dim.
"Yes," he replied, looking at her steadily, "it was a most delightful stroll."
She could stand the strain no longer; she came close to him and he stooped and tenderly kissed her.
"Oh, Jack, why do you persist in havinganything to do with her when you know how unhappy it makes me!" she said in her gentlest tone.
They sat down and he related the entire story of the occurrences of the afternoon to her. It pacified her to a degree.
"But Jack, dear, you will promise me never to see her again, will you not?" and her tone was pleading now.
"I promised to go with my brother to a suffrage meeting she is holding Thursday night. Of courseyouwould not wish to go, and I am certain you do not want me to break my promise."
"I am certain," she said, emphasizing each word, "that I do not want you to see her again."
"Let me understand you, Leonora, dear. There are many prominent New York women in this suffrage movement. Some of my very best old-time friends, I am informed, are participating in it. Is it your desire that I shall cut their acquaintance also, or is it just Miss Holland you want me never to see again?"
"Now, don't think I am jealous of her, for I am not. She is the most conspicuous one in this suffrage movement on account of the awfulthings she does, but I don't care to associate with any person who is identified with this crusade. Neither does my mother, nor any of our social set, and of course I would like you to feel the same way."
"But suppose I do not feel that way. Suppose my sympathies are with them and my profession as well as my political predilections should carry me among them?" he asked earnestly.
"Oh, Jack, what has come over you that you are so plebeian! Can't you see how these women are cheapening New York society, associating with workingmen and shop girls!"
"But that is what they should do in a democracy, and I am sure I never saw better-looking women in my life than these same busy suffragists. They have something to do, and are not dying ofennuior listlessness," he answered.
"Their stock argument," she answered, "but whoever heard of an aristocracy based on such things as these women engage in. Promise me, Jack, that you will have nothing to do with any of them."
"You are unduly wrought up to-night," he answered, "but I will promise you that I shall do nothing to cause you unnecessary annoyance.You must not be too captious, dear, and remember that I go Thursday night."
She started to protest, but he drowned the effort in a shower of caresses and bade her goodnight. Each of them, in the silence of their own apartments, thought long and earnestly of this interview. Leonora Kimball had been taught to believe that the chief badges of an aristocracy were complete idleness of the women, and the possession of enough wealth to support such idleness. It mattered not how mentally insipid or morally opaque or physically inane such women might be, the true test of being fitted for the purple was whether or not they had ever done any useful work, and whether or not they had money enough so that the other members of their set might feel assured that they never would do any useful work. An aristocracy of trained brains or unselfish culture were meaningless terms to her.
But this night she was greatly disturbed over the attitude of the man she was to marry. She had been quite honest with him when she asserted that jealousy was foreign to her nature; affection did not run deep enough with her to strike its eternal renewing fountain—jealousy. The practical character with whichshe had been endowed easily enough conducted affairs of the heart along paths directed by the head, and while her professions of love were quite sincere and her loyalty beyond question, yet she had not the remotest idea of the grand passion. She knew that she was very fond of John Earl; that he was worthy of her; that he could sustain her manner of life and that his social standing was all that either she or her mother could desire. She also knew that she did not wish to lose him, and much as she abhorred the suffragists, she determined to be lenient with his present mood, certain she could change it ere long, else of what avail was the all-powerful "silent influence" upon which the Anti-Suffragists laid so much stress?
Earl was more than disturbed by her attitude, for he discovered traits of character and a shallowness of sympathy that shocked him. His dream of married bliss was the absolutecamaraderiehe expected it to bring. He feared now that she would not enter into his life or ambitions, and, like too many of his married acquaintances, they would be seeking happiness along diverse paths.
"However, it's all very new to her," he said to himself after an hour's reverie, "and she isquite young. A few weeks will properly adjust our relations."
The dominant characteristic of this young man was a deep sense of justice, and while other feelings were all too manifest in his subconscious being, he permitted himself only to try to solve the problem of what was the right thing along the lines where he had cast his future.
CHAPTER IXLOVE, JEALOUSY AND MUSIC
The telephone bell in her apartment was ringing as Miss Holland entered from her stroll, radiantly happy and at peace with all the world. She took the receiver from the maid.
"Dr. Morris? Yes, I shall be home this evening, and glad to see you, of course. Bring your violin and come by eight-thirty. Yes—yes. I meant to have called you and apologized for my somewhat cavalier desertion of you last night. I am sorry I was rude, I didn't mean to be, but come and let me ask you to forgive me." Her tone was adorable and melted the sullen mood of the man at the other end of the wire.
Having sworn that he would not see her again, having 'phoned to make an appointment at which he meant to utter as bitter reproaches as he dared, he appeared promptly at the hourset, ready to implore her grace and accept with gratitude any smallest favor, any ray of hope she might see fit to bestow upon him.
Like many another professional man in New York, in order to cater to the class in society in which he hoped to establish his reputation and clientele, Morris had found it necessary to live in a style which far exceeded his income, although that was a good one for a man still young in his profession. He was not popular with men, who regarded him as rather theatrical and aposeur, but his music, a certain deference of manner, a more romantic quality than is to be generally found among American business men, gave him a great vogue with women, and he cultivated them, especially the older ones, and they made life very pleasant for him, introduced him to the right people, and gave him much good advice now and then.
One of the smartest of these social leaders said practically one day: "My dear boy, why do you let all these rich girls marry those silly foreigners, without an idea to bless themselves with—dukes, debts and diseases seem synonymous; you are not only clever, but you have the one gift, saving the title, that commends these creatures to our girls."
He smiled his inscrutable smile and bowed. "And that is?"
"You seem to have found the lost art of making pretty speeches, and paying a woman the small attentions that we all like so well. If I were a man," went on this dreadful dame, "I should never forget to kiss my wife and send her flowers and remember all the family anniversaries. It is by attention to such small details as this that a man may purchase immunity in larger and more important matters. I know this is most immoral, but it makes the wife happy, the husband comfortable, and would go far to decimate the divorce rate, so what more could you ask?"
"Perhaps I owe this to the fact that my father was a Hungarian nobleman—oh, just a trumpery little title, with nothing to pay for the necessary gold lace, so when he came to America he decided, like so many of the revolutionists of that period, to be ultra-American, and dropped even the foreign spelling of the name, changing the 'itz' to plain 'r-i-s,'" he answered. "I'm sure my music belongs to the other side of the Atlantic."
"That accounts for it all," she said. "There is absolutely no reason why you shouldn'tmarry almost any woman you want to. Why not find one who can give you millions in money and the social position you need without taking a generation to create one? I hope you haven't any foolish entanglements," she added.
He flushed, but did not answer, and when a few weeks later he and Silvia Holland had played together for some charitable entertainment, his venerable mentor had sought him out, ready to bestow her blessing at the earliest possible moment, approving his practical judgment and his good taste. That was a long time ago.
He had resented the implication at the time; to do him justice, had Silvia been penniless she would still have attracted him as no other woman ever had. It was partly her personal charm, partly her music. It may be true that the world of art is still the world, but it is a very different world from that in which most of us live and move and have our being, and Morris was conscious when her fingers touched the keys, and he took up his bow and drew it across the strings of his violin, that they entered upon a new and boundless universe in which sound superseded all other mediums of communication, and seemed to take the placeof mere mundane sensation. Whether his passion for Silvia grew out of their music, or the wonder of the music was a result of the perfect accord of their natures, he could not tell. They had become one in his mind.
He fervently hated her various public activities. Here again the ancestral traits dominated. He thought of her as a great lady, and being that, she should have been content without anything more. Rushing madly about doing things for other people implied a certain loss of caste. But until the previous evening his discontent had been free from the bitter draught of jealousy. There had been safety in the number of Miss Holland's admirers, and when he was surest that she did not in any way return his feeling for her, there had been balm in the thought that she was too busy elevating the condition of her own sex to have much time to waste upon any member of his. Instinctively he knew, when he intercepted the first look between the lady of his dreams and his erstwhile college associate, that the hour had come that he had dreaded. Silvia Holland had at last met a man whom, consciously or unconsciously, she acknowledged king. His rival was there, upon the threshold of her life, and he was arival to be feared. That he might also be a rival in his profession, that he was so rich that he was far above the straits in which Morris found himself more and more frequently involved, only added to the flame that consumed him; life without Silvia herself would be dull, colorless, objectless; life without her music would be but "wind along the waste."
He had no patience with the theories of the newer medical practitioners who refuse to be frightened by the cry of "professional ethics" or by the demand that practice shall be "regular" whether the patient survives or not; and yet while he denounced all forms of mental therapeutics, he was conscious of a strain of superstition which he could in no wise overcome. Weird folk-lore and uncanny rites kept up by some of the primitive people of Hungary had had a strange fascination for him when he was abroad. In himself, he found a singular mixture of the primeval savage, and the ultra refined that approaches decadence. Of one thing alone he was certain. To lose Silvia was to lose his soul; without her there was neither here nor hereafter. Ruthlessly as he had brushed aside the one woman in his life who came between them, he was prepared tothrust out of his way any man who sought to become a part of her life.
It was in this mood that he entered her presence, and in this mood he accepted heramende honorable, which she made with charming humility, but when she would have led him to the music-room, for once he hesitated.
"In a few minutes," he said, "but just now there is something I must say to you. It is true that I was deeply hurt last night, but your regret, so graciously expressed, emboldens me to think that you would not willingly hurt me." He stopped, and she looked at him with a rather puzzled air. "We have been friends for a great while," he said irrelevantly.
"Yes," she said cordially, and somewhat relieved. "Haven't we? And what a friendship it has been! A triangular affair, like a loving cup—you and I and some one of the great masters of melody. Shall it be Chopin to-night, or shall we begin with something lighter and finish with the Twelfth Nocturne, as usual?"
She led the way, and stood by the piano, rippling her fingers over the keys, and he stood before her, his face white and intense with feeling. He laid his strong, brown fingers over the white ones, and raised them to his lips, andSilvia laughed a trifle nervously. It was one of his old-world ways that she liked, but disapproved with all proper democratic fervor.
"Has it indeed been a loving cup from which we have drunk?" he said, with passionate sadness. "I dare not think so, I dare not even hope so much grace! And yet how is it possible that a man should feel what I feel for you unless there is a response, little as he may deserve it——"
He paused, and she took away her hand, and laid it lightly on his shoulder as he sank down on the seat before the piano.
"Please don't," she said gently. "Don't you see that you are quite right? If it were really, truly love that had come to you, I should feel it also, there could be no question of doubting or daring; no thought of hopelessness. Some time you will know that this is true, when some other heart speaks to yours in the unmistakable tone of the one only love of your heart. Each of us has his place in life, and in the lives of those with whom we come in contact. No one can ever have your place; I can't tell you how much rest and happiness you have brought me when I have been a-weary of this world. Come,Orrin, don't rob me of my friend that I may lose a lover."
By a herculean effort he restrained his feelings, and answered lightly, "You shall keep your friend, my sorceress of song," but he added under his breath, "Look to it, when the lover comes, for you may still losehim." Then he took up his violin, and the night became a splendid harmony, despite the discord that raged in his soul.