On the thick summer air, in the close room, the scent of flowers was overpowering. Laurence, standing by the door, looking round at the silent black assemblage, at the black coffin heaped with roses, felt deeply impatient with this show of grief. No one there grieved for the Judge, except perhaps Nora, sobbing in a corner, and himself. Mary was upstairs, not able to be present.
He looked coldly at Hilary, reading in his deep musical voice the funeral service. It was the custom to pronounce a panegyric on the departed; and he wondered what Hilary would say, and waited cynically for some hypocritical praise, for how could the preacher appreciate the Judge's real qualities? But he underrated Hilary's honesty. In truth it was impossible for Hilary to praise the Judge's life and character. It was not for him to betray the confidence of the old man's last days, of his fears, doubts and regrets, his halting steps toward the unknown. So he uttered simply a brief prayer, full of solemn tenderness for the passing soul. In Hilary's feeling the infinite was like the living air surrounding, interpenetrating, every finite thing; there was no line between life and death, except for a personal loss. To him also, the funeral panoply was unpleasant; he also reflected that the Judge had perhaps only one or two real mourners.
When it was all over and Laurence had returned tothe house alone, he went up to see Mary. She was lying in bed, in the big room they shared together; she looked very white and tired and had evidently been weeping. Laurence bent to kiss her tenderly, and sat by her, holding her hand.
"He was a good friend to us," she said at last softly.
"Yes, he was, indeed."
"He thought everything of you, Laurence."
"I didn't deserve it especially."
"I'm sorry for him now, I'm afraid he feels very lonely."
Laurence looked at her uneasily.
"Because, you see," she went on slowly, "he never thought about his soul, till just lately, or about another life. It will be very strange to him. He was so worldly."
"He was a good man," asserted Laurence, frowning.
"No, Laurence, he wasn't," said Mary with inflexible regret. "He was bound up in worldly things, and had no light. So it will be hard for him."
"I don't think you are in a position to judge him," said Laurence sharply.
But then, seeing her tears begin to flow again, he reproached himself and tried to comfort her with soft words and kisses. He resolved once more that until Mary was quite strong again he would not cross her in anything, that even if she were unreasonable he would remember her state and be patient. He was really alarmed about her, she had never been ill before, never in the least morbid. Several times lately she had frightened him by saying that she thought she would die when this baby was born; and dissolving in tearsfor the other two babies who would be left motherless. Altogether she was unlike herself. Laurence, profoundly worried, had talked to Mary's father, who told him that she had had her children too fast and was tired out for the time, and naturally affected by the Judge's illness, but that there was no cause for great alarm. But at the mere idea of losing Mary, Laurence was deeply shaken. He would not have said that he was happy with her—in fact for the past year he had seldom felt happy—but he couldn't imagine being anything but miserable without her. He had loved her too long, too exclusively, to live without her. And always he had the hope, though sometimes unconscious, that she would change and love him as he wanted her to. That was all that was lacking, he thought, to make him perfectly happy. He believed in happiness and never ceased to expect it.
"Laurence," said Mary, when her tears had stopped, insensibly soothed by his tenderness, "I wish the Judge hadn't left us that money. We didn't need it."
"Well, sometimes I wish so too," he answered thoughtfully.
He was perfectly sincere in this. At times, after the Judge's will was made, the thought of the money had weighed on him. He disliked the feeling of obligation, even to the Judge; he would have liked to owe his advancement to his own efforts alone. But the Judge had stood behind him and helped him on, in every way. He was grateful, and yet he was burdened by that help.
In later years he was never able to forget it. Then it seemed to him that he owed his career to the Judgeand to the condemned criminal Barclay, who had died in prison, for it was the Barclay case that gave him his professional start. He showed gratitude as best he could. He put up for the Judge a massive monument of granite; and he maintained Barclay's children. But he would have preferred to be independent of any assistance. He was conscious of powers that could make their way unaided. And he disliked the feeling that he had not been able to mould his life just as he wished, that in some ways it seemed made for him by forces beyond his control. That feeling did not yet oppress him, he was still too full of youthful energy; it was only an occasional shadow.
But many times, in the course of the next months, Laurence wished the Judge's money at the devil or in the hands of his disappointed relatives. Laurence, as executor of the will, had to deal with innumerable details and complexities that bored and bothered him; he hated "business." When finally the estate was settled, the relatives having decided not to contest the will, Laurence found himself in possession of a handsome income. The Judge had shown his faith in the future of Chicago by investing largely in real estate there; these holdings were rapidly increasing in value. They were in the business section and the rentals were high. In addition, the Judge's house and its contents, and his horses, were left personally to Laurence.
For a time, his enjoyment of these things was clouded. The attitude of the Judge's relatives had stung him, in spite of his consciousness that his efforts alone had procured them any share in the property. He was extremely sensitive to disapproval, to criticism, especially to any reflection on his independence. To feel that some people, perhaps many of his fellow-citizens, thought his relation with the Judge an interested one, that he might be suspected of "making a good thing" out of the Judge's friendship, galled him deeply. He knew that never in his life had he used any indirect means for his own advancement, that he was incapable of using people for his own interest, and he hated to appear what he was not. It was more than the pride of an honest man in keeping his reputation clear of any spot. Laurence cared more than he could admit about public opinion, about his position in the eyes of his fellow-citizens. Their admiration was necessary to him. His ambition could be satisfied only by predominance without any shadow on it, any reproach or sneer.
Professionally he understood how to keep himself safe from anything of that sort. There he stood on solid rock. His reputation for uprightness, for indifference to money, was unquestioned. He began to be considered "eccentric"; no one could predict what cases he would take, what refuse, except that the more unpromising a case appeared, the more apt he was to take it. He made enemies, of course; but this sort of enmity pleased him. He liked to be called "quixotic" and to be accused of "tilting at windmills." In the law he knew perfectly well what he was about. His law was sound; he worked faithfully and constantly to build up his knowledge. He aspired to the judicial ermine, and a spot upon it would have killed his pride. He would be known as an able and incorruptible judge.
He would not owe his position to politics, either, if he could help it. Judge Baxter had been a busy politician, and had striven to initiate Laurence into the local situation. But Laurence had not been interested; he hated wire-pulling and contests for power. Naturally he belonged to the party that had supported the war and was now all-powerful. But he wanted none of the spoils, at present. His political activity was confined to supporting what he thought good candidates and opposing bad ones; his test being the public welfare. He had identified himself more than he would have thought possible with his town. Its growth and prosperity had become important to him. He wanted the town improved and did not want it plundered, and had made his position clear. It suited him—active, and yet aloof from any vulgar scramble for profit. The enemies made for him by this activity he despised; they could not hurt him, he was too strong. The public esteem that he cared for was increased rather than otherwise by their opposition.