So far not a word had come from Madeleine. Philip had rung the bell of the Eggleston mansion three times since that fatal morning and had been told by the butler in frigid tones that Miss Eggleston “was not at home.” None of his notes were answered. That so sensible a girl as Madeleine, one whose whole nature was frankness and love, could be so cruel and so unjust was a disappointment more bitter than the failure.
“She has been lied to by somebody,” broke out Philip as he paced up and down Adam’s studio, “or she is locked up where nothing can reach her. All my notes come back unopened; the last redirected by Mr.Eggleston himself. Neither he nor his son has been to the office since the settlement. They leave me to sweep up after them—dirty piece of business. Will there be any use in your seeing Mr. Eggleston?”
Adam looked into space for a moment.
He had never met the senior. He had, out of deference to Phil, and contrary to his habitual custom, given him preference over his other sitters, but Eggleston had not kept his appointment and Gregg had postponed the painting of the portrait until the following season. Phil had made excuses, but Adam had only smiled and with the remark—“Time enough next winter,” had changed the subject.
“No. Let a young girl manage her own affairs,” Adam answered in a decided tone, “especially a girl like Madeleine.” He had seen too much misery from interfering with a young girl’s heart.
“What do you advise then?”
“To let the storm blow over,” Adam replied firmly.
“But you’ve said that for a week and I am no better off. I can’t stand it much longer, Old Gentleman. Imustsee Madeleine, I tell you. What can you do to help? Now—not to-morrow or next week?”
“Nothing that would be wise.”
“But you promised me to go and see her the afternoon we went to smash.”
“So I did, and I’ll go if you wish me to.”
“When?”
“To-morrow morning. It is against my judgment to do anything until you hear from her. A woman alwaysfinds the way. Madeleine is no exception. She loves you too well not to. But I’ll go, my boy, and try.”
“Youmustgo. I tell you I can’t and won’t wait. I have done nothing I’m ashamed of. Our wedding is off, of course, until I can look around and see what I’m going to do, but that’s no reason why we can’t continue to see each other.”
The butler met him with a polite but decided: “Miss Eggleston is not receiving.”
“Take her that card,” said Gregg. “I’ll wait here for an answer.”
The erect figure of the painter, his perfect address, coupled with the air of command which always seemed a part of him, produced an instantaneous curve in the butler’s spine.
“Step into the library, sir,” he said in a softer tone as he pushed aside the heavy portières for Adam to enter.
Gregg entered the curtain-muffled room with its marble statues, huge Sèvres vases and ponderous gold frames, swept a glance over the blue satin sofas and cumbersome chairs in the hope of finding Madeleine curled up somewhere among the heap of cushions, and then, hat in hand, took up his position in front of the cheerless, freshly varnished hearth to await that young lady’s coming. What he would say or how he would approach the subject nearest to his heart would depend on her mental attitude. That she loved Phil as dearlyas he loved her there was no question. That she had begun to suffer for loss of him was equally sure. A leaf from his own past told him that.
Again the butler’s step was heard in the hall; there came a sound of an opening door, and Mr. Eggleston entered.
As he approached the dealer’s description of his white hair and red face—a subject Franz Hal would have loved—came back to the painter.
Adam advanced to meet him with that perfect poise which distinguished him in surprises of this kind. “Mr. Eggleston, is it not?”
“Yes, and whom have I the pleasure of addressing?”—glancing at the card in his hand.
“I am Adam Gregg. We were to meet some time ago, when I was to paint your portrait. This time I came to see your daughter Madeleine.”
Mr. Eggleston’s manner dropped thermometer-like from the summer heat of graciousness to the zero of reserve: the portrait was no longer a pleasant topic. Moreover he had always believed that the painter had advised Philip the morning of his “asinine declination” of the trust company’s proposition.
“May I ask what for?” It was a brutal way of putting it, but the banker had a brutal way of putting things. Generally he confounded the person before him with the business discussed, venting upon him all his displeasure.
“To try and have her receive Philip Colton, or at least to get her reason for not doing so. It may be thatit is due to your own objection; if so I should like to talk the matter over with you.”
“You are quite right, sir; I do object—object in the strongest manner. I don’t wish him here. I’ve had all I want of Mr. Colton, and so has my daughter.”
“May I ask why?”
“I don’t know that it is necessary for me to discuss it with you, Mr. Gregg.”
“I am his closest friend, and have known him ever since he was five years old.”
“Then I positively decline to discuss it with you, sir, for I should certainly say something that would wound your feelings. It is purely a matter of business, and that you artists never understand. If you will excuse me I will return to Mrs. Eggleston; she is an invalid, as you have no doubt heard, and I spend the morning hour with her. I must ask you to excuse me, sir.”
On his return to his studio Gregg began to pace the floor, his habit when anything worried him. Phil was to return at three o’clock and he had nothing but bad news for him. That his visit had only made matters worse was too evident. Never in all his life had he been treated with such discourtesy. Eggleston was a vulgarian and a brute, but he was Madeleine’s father, and he could not encourage her to defy him. He, of course, wanted these two young people to meet, but not in any clandestine way. Her father, no doubt, would soon see things differently, for success was the foot-ruleby which he measured a man, and Phil, with his energy and honesty, would gain this in time. Phil must wait. Everything would come right once the boy got on his legs again. The failure had in every way been an honest one. In this connection he recalled the remark of a visitor who had dropped into the studio the day before and who in discussing the failure had said in the crisp vernacular of the Street: “Bitten off more than they could chew, but square as a brick.” It was an expression new to him but he had caught its meaning. That his fellow-brokers had this opinion of Philip meant half the battle won. Men who by a lift of their fingers lose or make fortunes in a din that drowns their voices, and who never lie or crawl, no matter what the consequences, have only contempt for a man who hides his wallet. “Hands out and everything you’ve got on the table,” is their creed. This done their pockets are wide open and every hand raised to help the other fellow to his feet.
All these thoughts raced through Adam’s head as he continued to pace the floor. Now and then he would stop in his walk and look intently at some figure in the costly rug beneath his feet, as if the solution of his problem lay in its richly colored surface. Two questions recurred again and again: What could he do to help? and how could he get hold of Madeleine?
As the hours wore on he became more restless. Early that morning—before he had gone to Madeleine’s—his brush, spurred by his hopes, had worked as if it had been inspired. Not only had the sitter’shead been blocked in with masterly strokes, but with such fulness and power that few of them need ever be retouched—a part of his heart, in fact, had gone into the blending of every flesh tone. But it was all over now; his enthusiasm and sureness had fled. In fact, he had, on his return, dropped his brushes into his ginger-jar for his servant to clean, and given up painting for the day.
Soon he began fussing about his studio, looking over a portfolio for a pose he needed; replacing some books in his library; adding fresh water to the roses that stood under Olivia’s portrait—gazing up into its eyes as if some help could be found in their depths—his uneasiness increasing every moment as the hour of Phil’s return approached.
At the sound of a quick step in the corridor—how well he knew the young man’s tread—he threw open the door and pushed aside the velvet curtain. Better welcome the poor fellow with a smile and a cheery word.
“Come in, Phil!” he cried—“Come—Why, Madeleine!”
She stood just outside the door, a heavy brown veil tied over her hat, her trim figure half concealed by a long cloak. For an instant she did not speak, nor did she move.
“Yes, it’s I, Mr. Gregg,” she sobbed. “Are you sure there’s nobody with you? Oh, I’m so wretched! I had to come: Please let me talk to you. Father told me you had been to see me. He was furious whenyou went away, and I know how he must have behaved to you.” She seemed completely prostrated. Buoyant temperaments pendulate in extremes.
He had drawn her inside now, his arms about her, holding her erect as he led her to a seat with the same tenderness of voice and manner he would have shown his own daughter.
“You poor, dear child!” he cried at last. “Now tell me about it. You know how I love you both.”
“Oh, Mr. Gregg, it is so dreadful!” she moaned in piteous tone as she sank upon the cushions of the divan, Adam sitting beside her, her hand tight clasped in his own. “I didn’t think Phil would bring all this trouble on us. I would forgive him anything but the way in which he deceived papa. He knew there was no copper in the mine, and he kept saying there was, and went right on speculating and using up everything they had, and then when it was all to be found out he turned coward and ruined everybody—and broke my heart! Oh, the cruel—cruel—” and again she hid her face in the cushions.
“What would you think, little girl, if I told you that I advised him to do it?” he pleaded as he patted her shoulder to quiet her.
“You couldn’t do it!” Madeleine burst out in an incredulous tone, raising herself on her elbow to look the better into his eyes. “Youwouldn’tdo it! You are too kind.”
“But I did—as much for your sake and your father’s and brother’s as for his own. All the firm has lost sofar is money. That can be replaced. Had Philip not told the truth it would have been their honor. That could never have been replaced.”
And then with her hands fast in his, every thought that crossed her mind revealed in her sweet, girlish face, Adam, his big, frank, brown eyes looking into hers, told her the story of Philip’s resolve. Not the part which the portrait had played—not one word of that. She would not have understood; then, too, that was Phil’s secret, not his, to tell; but the awakening of the dormant nature of an honest man, incrusted with precedents and half-strangled in financial sophistries, to the truth of what lay about him.
“You wouldn’t want his lips to touch yours, my child, if they were stained with a lie; nor could you have worn your wedding-gown if the money that paid for it had been stolen. Your father will see it in the same light some day. Then, if he had a dozen daughters he would give every one of them to men like Philip Colton. The boy wants your help now; he is without a penny in the world and has all his life to begin over again. Now he can begin it clean. Get your arms around his neck and tell him you love him and trust him. He needs you more to-day than he will ever need you in all his life.”
She had crept closer to him, nestling under his big shoulders. It seemed good to touch him. Somehow there radiated from this man a strength and tenderness which she had never known before: In the tones of his voice, in the feel of his hand, in the restfulness that pervadedhis every word and gesture. For the first time, it seemed to her, she realized what it was to have a father.
“And won’t you talk to papa again, Mr. Gregg?” she pleaded in a more hopeful voice.
“Yes, if you wish me to, but it would do no good—not now. It is not your father this time, it’s you. Will you help Phil make the fight, little girl? You love him, don’t you?”
“Oh, with all my heart!”
“Well, then, tell him so. He will be here in a few minutes.”
Madeleine sprang from her seat:
“No, I must not see him,” she cried in frightened tones; “I promised my father. I came at this time because I knew he would not be here. Let me go: We are having trouble enough. No—please, Mr. Gregg—no, I must go.”
“And what shall I tell Phil?” He dared not persuade her.
“Tell him—tell him—Oh, Mr. Gregg, you know how I love him!”
She was through the curtains and halfway down the corridor before he could reach the door. All the light had come back to her eyes and the spring to her step.
Adam walked to the banisters and listened to the patter of her little feet descending the stairs to the street. Then he went back into the studio and drew the curtains. Thank God, her heart was all right.
Once more he picked his brushes from the ginger-jar where in his despair he had thrust them. Nothing in the situation had changed. The fear that Madeleine had lost her love for Phil had never troubled him for an instant. Women’s hearts did not beat that way. That Phil’s future was assured once he got his feet under him was also a foregone conclusion. What Mr. Eggleston thought about it was another matter, and yet not a serious one. He might be ugly for a time—would be—but that was to be expected in a man who had lost his special capital, a son-in-law and considerable of his reputation at one blow. What had evidently hurt the banker most was the wounding of his pride. He had always stood well with Mr. Stockton—must continue to do so when he realized how many of his other interests depended on his good-will and the trust company’s assistance. Phil had not told Adam this when he went over the scene in the office the morning they closed up the accounts, but Gregg had read between the lines. The one bright ray of sunshine was Madeleine’s refusal to break her word to her father. That pleased him most of all.
A knock at the door interrupted his revery. It did not sound like Phil’s, but Adam had been deceived once before and he hurried to meet him.
This time a messenger stood outside.
“A note for Mr. Adam Gregg,” he said. “Are you the man?”
Adam receipted the slip, dismissed the boy andstepped to the middle of the room under the skylight to see the better. It was from Phil.
“I cannot reach you until late. Have just received a note from the Seaboard Trust Company saying Mr. Stockton wants to see me. More trouble for P. C. & Co., I guess. Hope for good news from Madeleine.”
“I cannot reach you until late. Have just received a note from the Seaboard Trust Company saying Mr. Stockton wants to see me. More trouble for P. C. & Co., I guess. Hope for good news from Madeleine.”
This last note filled his mind with a certain undefined uneasiness. What fresh trouble had arisen? Had some other securities on which money had been loaned—made prior to Phil’s awakening—been found wanting in value? He hoped the boy’s past wasn’t going to hurt him.
With this new anxiety filling his mind he laid down his brushes—he had not yet touched his canvas—put on his hat and strode out into the street. A breath of fresh air would clear his head—it always did.
For two hours he walked the pavements—up through the Park; out along the edge of the river and back again. With every step there came to him the realization of the parallels existing between his own life’s romance and that of Philip’s. Some of these were mere creations of his brain; others—especially those which ended in the sacrifice of a man’s career for what he considered to be right—had a certain basis of fact. Then a shiver crept over him: For honor he had lost the woman he loved: Was Phil to tread the same weary path and for the same cause? And if fate should be thus cruel would he and Madeleine forget in time and lead their lives anew and apart, or would their souls cry out in anguish as his had done all theseyears, each day bringing a new longing and each day a new pain: he in all the vigor of his manhood and the full flower of his accomplishment and still alone and desolate.
With these reflections, none of them logical—but all showing the perturbed condition of his mind and his anxiety for those he loved, he mounted the stairs of the building and pushed open the door of his studio.
It had grown quite dark and the studio was filled with shadows. As he crossed to the mantel—he rarely entered the room without pausing for a moment in front of the portrait—Olivia’s face, with that strange, wan expression which the fading light always brought to view, seemed to stand out from the frame as if in appeal, a discovery that brought a further sinking of the heart to his already overburdened spirit.
With a quick movement, as if dreading the power of prolonged darkness, he struck a match and flashed up the circle of gas jets, flooding the studio with light.
Suddenly he stopped and swept his eyes rapidly around the room. Some one beside himself was present. He had caught the sound of a slight movement and the murmur of whispering voices. Then a low, rippling laugh fell upon his ears—the notes of a bird singing in the dark, and the next instant Madeleine sprang from behind a screen where she had been hiding and threw her arms around his neck.
“Guess!” she cried, pressing his ruddy cheeks, fresh from his walk, between her tiny palms. “Guess what’s happened! Quick!”
The revulsion was so great that for the moment he lost his breath.
“No! you couldn’t guess! Nobody could. Oh, I’m so happy!Father’s—made—it—up—with—Phil!”
“Made it up! How do you know?” he stammered.
“Phil’s just left him. Come out, Phil!”
Phil’s head now peered from behind the screen.
“What do you think of that, Old Gentleman?” he cried, clasping Adam’s outstretched hand.
“And there isn’t any trouble, Phil, over Mr. Stockton’s note?” exclaimed Gregg in a joyous but baffled tone of voice: he was still completely at sea over the situation.
“Trouble over what?” asked Phil, equally mystified.
“That’s what I want to know. You wrote me that it meant more trouble for your firm.”
“Yes, but that was before I had seen Mr. Stockton. Then I ran across Mr. Eggleston just as he was coming out of the trust company, and he sent me to Madeleine—and we couldn’t get here quick enough. She beat me running up your stairs. Hasn’t she told you? And you don’t know about Stockton’s letter? No! Why, he has offered me the position of head of the bond department of the trust company at a salary of ten thousand a year, and I go to work to-morrow! Here’s his letter. Let me read you the last clause:”
“No, let me,” cried Madeleine, reaching for the envelope.
“It is all her doing, Phil.”“It is all her doing, Phil.”
“No—I’ll read it,” begged Phil.
“No, you won’t! I’ll read it myself!” burst out Madeleine, catching the letter from Phil’s hand and whirling around the room in her glee. “Listen: ‘The Trust Company needs men like you, Mr. Colton, and so does the Street!’ Isn’t that lovely?”
“And that’s not all, Old Gentleman!” shouted Phil. “We are going to be married in a month. What do you think of that!”
“And Mr. Eggleston is willing!”
“Willing!Why, you don’t think he would offend Mr. Stockton, do you?”
Gregg had them in his arms now—Madeleine a bundle of joyous laughter; Phil radiant, self-contained, determined.
For a brief moment the three stood silent. A hush came over them. Adam’s head was bent, his forehead almost touching Phil’s shoulder, a prayer trembling on his lips. Then with a sudden movement he led them to the portrait, and in an exultant tone, through which an unbidden sob fought its way, he cried:
“Look up, my children—up into your mother’s face. See the joy in her eyes! It is all her doing, Phil.”
“Oh! my beloved, now you know.”
The picture has never been taken from Gregg’s studio. It still keeps its place over the mantel. There is rarely a day that one of the three does not place flowers beneath it; sometimes Madeleine and Phil arrangethem; sometimes Adam; and sometimes little blue-eyed, golden-haired Olivia is lifted up in Gregg’s strong arms so that she may fill the jar with her own wee hands.
1. Minor changes have been made to correct typesetters’ errors; otherwise, every effort has been made to remain true to the author’s words and intent.
2. The original book from which this etext was transcribed did not have a Table of Contents; one has been provided for the reader’s convenience.