—Our world unfolds beyond itself,It is a yearning, it is a leaping toward God.—I see Him!When the trees break out,When the trees heave up,—I see Him!When men dance like little trees full of Springtime,There you are, God. Here.... I am unafraid.You cannot kill me, for I am part of your Spring.
—Our world unfolds beyond itself,It is a yearning, it is a leaping toward God.—I see Him!When the trees break out,When the trees heave up,—I see Him!When men dance like little trees full of Springtime,There you are, God. Here.... I am unafraid.You cannot kill me, for I am part of your Spring.
—Our world unfolds beyond itself,It is a yearning, it is a leaping toward God.
—I see Him!When the trees break out,When the trees heave up,—I see Him!When men dance like little trees full of Springtime,There you are, God. Here.... I am unafraid.You cannot kill me, for I am part of your Spring.
* * *
In the warm smoke shadow of the room the chandelier thrust its gas tongues weakly. Beneath it on the table stood bottles of whiskey and gin and syphon water. Night. The backyards swathed silence: the shut of a window, the call of a cat were in the Night like little breaks in a close textured weave.
A slight man with heavy sparse-haired head on thin shoulders, frail chest, spoke in a singing voice. His English was good, the Irish brogue was thick.
“It’s this way—it’s this way. We sit here night after night and we have a good time. What is it we do really? We destroy ourselves, and that means we hurt less. We drug ourselves down to these parts of life which are happy.”
“Man is not happy?”
“Man,” Daniel Scome went on, “is caught between the fulness of the brute and the fulness of manhood. That’s where we are. We’re half way. And we’re weary and comfortless. Where we are we suffer. We cannot rest. We cannot forget. Because we are half way. We must go on, to a new happiness: or we must go back.”
“That’s what we do,” said Mangel. “We go back....”
A voice came from the shadow: “We got laws and governments ... we got arts and War, so we can go back comfortably. Yes.”
“We’re corrupted. Adam and Eve have damned us,” spoke the thrust, sure of itself, of Statt. “We don’t slump back. We’re naturally brutes.”
“I don’t believe you!” cried Mangel.
“Of course you don’t. You ain’t a Christian.”
“Nor you!” said Daniel Scome. “If we were naturally brutes, God would not bother about us.”
“Nor we about God,” said Fanny.
“It comes to the same thing. We are half way, I tell you. We got to push on ... or we got to fall back.”
Tessie sighed. “I am tired. I don’t want to do anything.”
“And I am tired too,” Susan chimed in. “So I don’t do anything. I don’t climb. I don’t fall. I’d like to see anyone of you budge me!”
“But you climb,” said Fanny softly: Susan did not hear. “You are all cold with climbing....”
In the corner beside Statt, shadowed, sat a tall spare creature with a knot of hair on a high fanatical brow, and eyes that burned blue in the dark.
“Sing then!” said he. His name was Loyden. If he had another name, no one there knew it. “If you’re tired, sing. If you want to go up, sing. If you want to fall back, sing!”
“Boy, you are crazy,” said Mangel.
Loyden: I didn’t say I wasn’t. You aren’t logical. I said,sing! That has nothing to do with crazy or not crazy.
Fanny: But if we want to be sane—
Scome: We want to be too many things. Loyden’s right. We want the truth—and we’re afraid of being mad. There we are caught, again, half way—half way between what is really One.
Loyden: We’re not caught when we sing ... not when we dance—
Statt: You old scarecrow, what are you preaching about? Who ever heard your voice? Who ever saw you shake a leg?
Loyden: I have forgotten how to—without the Music.
Tessie: Don’t talk about music! You get on my nerves.
Loyden: You see? It gets on her nerves. The weakling. Music oozed out of her, died down to her hands. And when they got twisted, it went away.
Scome: We don’t know how to dance. That’s why we’re here, drinking and loving women.
Susan: You don’t love us!
Clara: (muttering) Only a woman can love a woman.
Loyden: We don’t know how to dance. Dance for us, Judge Mark.
Mark: Shut up!
Loyden: (With a rising inflection to his voice) Dance for us, Mangel.
Mangel: I could read the Bible? Be still!
Loyden: The Western world is dying!
... There is a hush. And Loyden’s voice that was shrill moves down to a low monotone swaying within the heavy fumes and shadows of the room like a bird planing....
Loyden: Death creeps up. Death creeps down. The eyes are dead already. Who of the Western World can see? The feet and the legs are dead already. Where is there Dance, where is there Music among us? Among the Black men, among the Yellow men, among the Red men, yes. They still have living limbs. They still have living eyes. We stiffen with Death. Death creeps up, Death creeps down ... into the heart of the dying Western World.
... There was a pause. The eyes of all gazed into the shadow where a long thin head, wild-haired, wild-throated, cast out words upon them. The eyes of all turned: Fanny was out of her chair. She moved to the bottle-littered table under the gas. The yellow light lay heavy on her hair, made her face glow pallid about her eyes that were dark within themselves.
“I will dance for you,” she said.
She lifted her hands. They were little and very white upon her emaciate arms.
“Look up!”
But her eyes did not look up. They were dark and lost within themselves.
“I will dance for you. Look up!” So she stood, with her hands high, moveless.
The Night rolled slowly: lifting the room with a faint jerking onward. They felt the rhythm of the moving room, sailing upon the Night. Theirheads swayed and their eyes, upturned, stirred faintly, carried by the slow-voyaging room.
The arms of Fanny were rigid over her head. But she swayed along. The pulse in her throat swayed with it. Each thing of matter, each thing of thought in the room swayed on ... except the rigid arms of Fanny....
Stopped!... For the room was there.
They looked upon the miracle of their being still in the room. Chairs, lights, bottles, persons ... all was still in the room.
They got out of their chairs. They sank to their knees on the floor.
“No!” shouted Fanny.
They were afraid.
“You cannot dance on your knees! Get up! Can’t you see?”
They saw her above them: dancing. They saw the floor beneath them: dancing.... The walls! They clasped with terror for the pitching floor. They clawed and clasped. They found each other. They were glad. They subsided. Flesh pressed against flesh. Teeth knocked against teeth. Brows beat upon carpet....
In the corner, infinitely far from her, for he, like her arms, had not moved with the room, sat Loyden.
“What did I tell you, Luve? The Western World is dying.”
* * *
Still the candles burned on the mellow table: Samson Brenner and Mrs. Luve looked on each other’s faces above the flames. Rising and rising, the candle flames came lower. Lower at last than the faces of the woman and boy, and of the high wine glasses.
She said: “Steadily more and more, I came to think about your People. They were all about me. They were all sorts. I wanted something of them. But they knew nothing. They knew nothing of themselves. Where was the difference between them and us? They had the same women, they had the same money, they played the same miserable games for both. Why did I want something of them?...
“The Truth!... Perhaps because of Leon ... perhaps because of the ministry of Harry; because I knew of my own weakness—I wanted of them the Truth.
“There were six years of the House.”
“And then—?” the boy’s voice was hoarse. He felt the sordid room and the sordid flat. He had forgot the sordid reason of his coming. He felt the sharp incongruence of the wine he had drunk and of the slender glasses, and of the candles that rose and that burned, rising, lower, at the table. “What was the end?”
“The struggle between Jim Statt and Mangel grew. It grew bitter. Therewas no reason for it. Statt persecuted Abe ... pinched him and tortured him: above all humiliated him. Until what Tessie had foreseen came true.”
“What was that?”
“Mangel the dirty Jew—O he was that!—Mangel turned good.”
* * *
Clara is sick.
“I find nothing serious,” says the Doctor. “A bad bronchial cough, a chest none too strong but unaffected. Somewhat run-down—and nervous.” Fanny knew better—and worse.
Clara stays in bed. The House moves on. But with six years done, Fanny can see a difference: and in no fact more clearly than that Clara is sick.
—She is wearing out!Shewho is not thirty. The House is wearing out. I?
She brought her friend to her own room on the Fourth floor, where it was quieter, where they could be better together. The Fourth floor was a hush over the hard accent of the House.
“I am happy here,” smiled Clara. “It’s great fun being sick—and having you nurse me in your own dear place.”
Mark came little: came less. Nobody cared. Clara and Fanny thought nothing of that. But Clara got no better. There she was weak ... no worse ... but also no better.
“The House wears away,” thought Fanny ... and tried not to think of that. “What does that matter?” But the House went on.
Fanny shopped and ruled and entertained. There was the hush above that grew: there was the wonted accent of their world below, wearing, wearing....
“I am afraid perhaps, I’m just lazy,” Clara said. “Doc don’t think I’m sick. I’d better get up—“
“You’re tired, dear.”
“To-morrow I get up!”
“No.... Clara, when you get up, you’ll go back to your room downstairs. I love you, here, Clara.”
Clara’s heavy eyelids shut with a soft gesture of retiscence. The light in the room was dimmed. The wood was old and mellow all about them.
“Thank you,” she murmured.
Laughter and a volley of words pushed up.
“Who’s that?”
“Mildred Dozen is here. And Thelma——“
“They’re wild animals, aren’t they?”
“Yes. But Thelma’s stayed wild. Mildred’s a wild animal tamed....”
Clara pondered. “They fit down there.”
“You mean: we fit up here?”
Clara’s eyes large on her friend: “We fit together....”
Fanny sat beside her on the bed and took her hand. So they stayed. Fanny saw two lines running close ... red lines ...: they bellied out, wide, wide to hold the House: they ran in close once more. They were less red—dimmer.
Laughter and words below volleyed up to them ... anonymous, sharp.
“Tell me,” said Clara, “don’t you think—“
“What dear?”
“That we fit together?”
Fanny bent over the white face of her friend. Suddenly, she kissed her lips. She laughed.
“You’ll get better now.”
“Fanny,” the words came low. “Do I want to get better?”
It was afternoon, and Fanny serving tea.
She gave a cup to Jack Baruch: rich-bodied boy with thin long wrists and gold-curled hair, vague eyes, and a cupid’s Bow for a mouth.
She gave a cup to Foxie Wesser—master of Jack: a fellow angular and small with sharp nose, sharp eyes.
She gave a cup to Thelma Clark and to Mildred.
“I like tea,” said Jack.
“Why shouldn’t you?” asked Fanny. It struck her sudden how quietly these two young men were dressed in their excellent store clothes.
“Well, it’s funny to liketea. Luve, you’re a wonder, makin’ us come here and have a good time, drinkingtea.”
Thelma’s laughter: “Only boneheads need booze. I’m tryin’ and tryin’ to like tea. Ever since I been comin’ here, I been tryin’. But I can’t just. I’m a bonehead.”
“Wisht I had your wits,” said Mildred. She was blonde, doll-petite. Her lips curled lecherous in her narrow face.
“What d’ya mean?Ihave wits?” Thelma’s laughter. “I’m a damn fool. Ask Jack. That’s why I love him.”
She turned her face—honest face with square chin and high clear cheekbones—to the pretty boy she loved. It was plain she loved him.
—My friends! These boys, these girls. Jack Baruch who picks pockets. Wesser who handles men like Baruch and the gunmen for Mangel and for Statt—Wesser who was the Diplomat of pool-rooms, with his sharp smooth chin and his excellent English, and his intelligent calm. These girls—
Thelma got up. She kissed Jack, she kissed Fanny. She paid no attention to the other two.
“Me for my afternoon’s walk. Good-by.”
“You’re sensible, dear,” said Fanny: the lithe full body moved half in a prance away.
Wesser was still.—Where is the calm of Wesser? Wesser was troubled. The absence of Thelma who meant laughter and noise seemed to make him uncovered. He picked at his trousers. He smoked his cigar with a harsh swiftness ... he who was so smooth. Jack was jolly. He who had brought into the too hard sureness of the House a bloom of adolescent melancholy, laughed now loudly.
Jim Statt came in.
“Well, Wesser ... spoken to Fanny?”
“No,” he looked furtively away.
Statt grunted and sat.
“A’right then. I might ’a’ known you’d flinch. Well,Iwon’t.”
“Right-O,” Wesser’s eyes flashed. He muttered: “Your affair after all....”
“Have some tea, Jim?” Fanny held a cup.
“Thank you.... Have you seenThe World?”
“Now look here, Jim ... you know I never read the papers.”
“Of course not. You read up-to-date stuff like the Bible. I know you. But here you’ve been chewing with Wesser and Jack for an hour ... and he’s not told you a thing.”
“Lieutenant, I’ve been drinking tea. Shop ... and tea ... don’t rhyme.”
“Hell ... well Fanny, things are bad. Mangel was raided last night.”
Fanny gripped her chair. Sudden, she saw Clara upstairs in bed ... white ... in the House wearing, wearing.
“I didn’t have a damn thing to do with it, Fan,” Jim went on. “I know appearances are against me. I ain’t had no love for Abe Mangel. But I didn’t do it—“
“Well, you can fix that up—“
“If you’d read the papers like a modern citizen, you’d know better. Mangel knows I didn’t do it. Mangel’s gone crazy. He’s had his own place raided!”
“What!”
“And he’s an appointment for to-morrow morning with the District Attorney to peach on the whole damn System.”
Fanny was still. She took the paper that Statt handed her. She did not read it.
“He’ll go,” she murmured.
“He’s in earnest.”
“He’ll go. You’ve made him into this, Jim. He’ll go.”
“Unless we stop him.”
“You can’t.”
“Yes we can, Fanny. We can—and we got to-night to do it.”
“What do you mean?”
“Abe’s coming here to-night ... to talk to you.”
“Yes?”
“He goes out of that door—feet first.”
Fanny stood up.
“You mean—you dare to mean—“
Statt stood also. Mildred and Baruch and Wesser sat.
“Now look here, Fanny ... don’t be a damn fool too. Cards on the table. Wesser has the program all arranged. There’s no other way for any of us. Too late. The three boys are ready with the guns. Pfennig and Susan are off. They won’t be back till the coast is clear. So is the cook. And there ain’t any danger. You know the sureness of the House. If it’s done here, it’s done. And if it’snotdone here,—why it will be, earlier, somewhere else. Almost as safe. But your House goes to Hell. Do you get me?... Either here ... or out you go, the bunch of you.”
“Mark?”
Jim Statt smiled. “Have you seen Pfennig? Has he been here of late to see Clara, while she’s so sick? I guess not. And you won’t see himeither. He got wind o’ this comin’ ... the wise old owl ... before it came. He is safe—outside.”
“Tessie?”
“She’s gone with Pfennig. It’s been brewing for a long time, ever since Clara sort of dimmed. Everybody was wise, my dear Fanny, except you. You see too many ghosts.”
She saw the House, very real, clattering, crashing—
“You’re threatening me, Jim.”
“Fanny, not if you don’t act foolish. It’s too late, even if we could seal him up. You got the House here with Clara sick in it. Sick as hell. Tessie’s gone. Susan’s ready. It’s the best place to do a necessary job. That’s all, girl! Do you want to get smashed? Right away—turned out—and Clara too, right out of bed?”
Fanny stood calm a moment. Then she sat down.
“Get out of here, Statt,” she said, trying to calm her voice. “Get out of here. Quick!”
“Hold her!” cried Statt. Fanny leaped toward the back. Jack Baruch caught her.
“Jack—let go!”
“She won’t do it. I see that,” said Statt. “She’ll phone to Mangel.”
“Jack—let go!”
“I can’t, Fanny. I’m sorry.”
“Bind her to that chair.”
Statt watched the operation. “Now, bind the chair.” The rope ate tight and inevitable in her flesh.
“My men’ll come at ten ... and pull you ... and release you. Mangel pipes at the same hour. It’ll be at the Dominion Cafe—if you want toknow, dear. And as to you ... don’t forget: we have your story and you’ve got a daughter.” Fanny for a moment fainted in the burn of horror and shame that flooded her eyes. “Come now,” she heard him again as he turned to the others. “Out of this.”
They went before him docilely: not daring to look back.
But Statt looked back. He came back.
“You’ve always been crazy, Fanny Luve,” he said. “And now, doin’ this ... and for a dirty Jew ... for a Jew you don’t give a damn for ... for a Jew you can’t save.” He looked at her.
She lay strained in her bonds. But her mind was free. And her face, free looking at him, was calm.
Statt came forward a little more.
“Why are you crazy, Fanny Luve?”
He stooped to his knee: he kissed the hand of Fanny. Then he tramped out.
* * *
There was a smile on the face of Mrs. Luve. Her eyes saw happenings far away as if all happenings far away were happenings to smile on.
“For six hours I lay bound. I called and cried for Clara who was in bed upstairs. Just three flights up. She did not hear me.... She had heard too many other calls, I guess, since she lay there, to understand that this call was for her.” Mrs. Luve smiled. “No bell rang all that time, and I stopped calling....
“It seemed to me though, that I could hear the shot that got old Abe in the heart, as he stepped out into the street through the cafe’s swinging door.... Very soon after that, the police. Clara and I were thrown into the street. Clara died in the Hospital of pneumonia. That is all.”
ONE of the candles between the woman and the boy had burned faster than the other. It guttered, went out. She saw the death of Clara.... The long gray room full of the streaking stains of the white sick. Clara’s black hair and the wan sheet and the bars of the iron bed. Clara’s clasping arms, moist, shutting out life.—Let me die with you!... The fading eyes of Clara.
“You forgive me? forgive me? I should not have brought you in, O Fanny. I am glad to pay for that, I was mad! But there were six years.... I have loved you. Now, you, what are you going to do?”
“You forgive me, Clara? What becomes of any of us? I have loved you also.”
... “I murdered her. For what?... White Clara for a dirty Jew! Mangel is dead at any rate ... just dead in another place....”
“I was not sorry. Clara was dead. My friend! My world was gone. I did not feel sorrow. Walking the streets, the innumerable streets my soul was as upon a journey through numberless bodies and states of myself. Numberless moments. And yet my soul was One. It was unchanged. It moved through the broken sea of my Disaster, it knew it was One....
“It is One now. Here I am.... Four years I have been here. Susan and Tessie I never sawagain. Thelma came back. Dear Thelma. She has helped me. You know how. She saved ... I can’t guess by what means ... part of my furniture from the crash of the House. She is loyal like an animal. You do well, Samson Brenner, caring even in the way you care, for Thelma....
“Four years I have been here—“
Samson got up. Through the gloom of the heavy room he groped to the sideboard. He found another candle. He brought it back to the table. He lighted it with the other that was low, and set it alongside.
“I have a daughter,” she said, “nearly as big as you.”
—I want to speak! What can I say to this woman? It is hard, it will be braver to keep silent: not to break this stillness in which her will so strangely works—toward what? For her sake, I am still.
“I am a failure. Look at me, Boy. Look at me. Look at Fanny Dirk. There is light enough to look.”
He looked at her. But he saw only her eyes that were very strong and clear.
“You have talked with me long,” she said. “Be quiet with me now.”
They faced each other over the mellow table. It broadened, it narrowed: they were far and close. There was a wave in the room, making the table and the two flames and their own forms curve and refract, as if their eyes caught this reality of them together through some substance quick like flowing water.
“Be still,” she whispered.
The clock gave a stroke: “Half ... past ... eleven.”
—He stays!—He has listened to my words. He has heard my will.Carnally he came.That is swept away.My will has cleaned him unto me. He stays.
—He stays!—He has listened to my words. He has heard my will.Carnally he came.That is swept away.My will has cleaned him unto me. He stays.
—He stays!—He has listened to my words. He has heard my will.Carnally he came.That is swept away.My will has cleaned him unto me. He stays.
She watched him. Blond warm boy, with eyes tender and virgin: afraid of the brusque world. Boy with heart beating a measure beyond the reach of your eyes!
—Shall I learn now?What Leon promised? what the dolorous yearsFailed to fulfill?Shall I learn now from you?...He has stayed and been kind. Soon he will go away,Forgetting Thelma. Will you leave me knowledge?—O I do not understand ...Why I have wanted, why I have wanted ...Why I have fallen and fallen, looking for God!You, Boy, won’t you go awayAnd leave me Knowledge?...
—Shall I learn now?What Leon promised? what the dolorous yearsFailed to fulfill?Shall I learn now from you?...He has stayed and been kind. Soon he will go away,Forgetting Thelma. Will you leave me knowledge?—O I do not understand ...Why I have wanted, why I have wanted ...Why I have fallen and fallen, looking for God!You, Boy, won’t you go awayAnd leave me Knowledge?...
—Shall I learn now?What Leon promised? what the dolorous yearsFailed to fulfill?Shall I learn now from you?...He has stayed and been kind. Soon he will go away,Forgetting Thelma. Will you leave me knowledge?—O I do not understand ...Why I have wanted, why I have wanted ...Why I have fallen and fallen, looking for God!You, Boy, won’t you go awayAnd leave me Knowledge?...
Her hands were upon the table. His hands were near her hands upon the table. Their eyes joined. He rested upon the yearning of her eyes. His mind was empty.
—Go away. Yes. Before I have lost!Go, before your staying slays me, Boy.Go—leave me Knowledge!
—Go away. Yes. Before I have lost!Go, before your staying slays me, Boy.Go—leave me Knowledge!
—Go away. Yes. Before I have lost!Go, before your staying slays me, Boy.Go—leave me Knowledge!
He did not stir. His eyes lay within her own as in a womb, resting omnipotent, knowing no act. She held him.
—Go. Reveal to me!
The bell rang.
—Go!
The bell rang.
The bell drove an iron finger between his eyes and her own. His eyes stirred. The bell rang.
—Go! By the will of God, go!Leave me what my life has bled awayTo find at the Bottom ...
—Go! By the will of God, go!Leave me what my life has bled awayTo find at the Bottom ...
—Go! By the will of God, go!Leave me what my life has bled awayTo find at the Bottom ...
The bell rang. His eyes were quickened, for his senses knew not her but that the bell rang.
Fanny got up. He was fixed.... She felt a stirring under her heart.
“Hush, Edith my child,” she murmured, getting up.
Her body was stiff and leaden. But she felt with all her body how his eyes were quickened. Her own eyes turned her about.
Fanny moved with her eyes. His eyes, stirring to life beyond her, were within her womb like a child unborn.... “Hush Edith!”
She moved through the tunnelling hall, a shadow darker than it, about eyes that were wells of fire. She had put back the chain upon the door. Groping she loosed it. Thelma burst in....
Thelma Clark was there: exhilerant, laughing, savage.
“O you dear ... waiting all this time forme.” She swayed. “In the dark! Waiting, you sillies,with a candle between you. What’s the matter with the gas?”
The room flared bright.
—Give me your eyes. Not to her! Let me hold your eyes.
Thelma flung herself on Samson’s lap. She kissed him.
Fanny saw his eyes draw in, swerve to another orbit, flame away.... The line of Thelma’s thigh lashed in blue silk, the crumple of her little breasts bursting within the lowcut waist ... there, there.
The eyes of Samson died from the eyes of Fanny.
He stood. He touched Thelma’s lips with his hand.
“Come.”
They were gone....
Fanny heard the door shut. She was alone. She sat down where she had sat before at the table. She arose. She shut out the gas. A peal of Thelma’s laughter pierced the door. The room clapped close about the fainting flame of the one candle.
Fanny sat down where she had sat before. Beyond her rigid gaze was an empty place. Beyond the empty place was the Night. Within her gaze was the Night. Her eyes held nothing.
“And a Jew,” she murmured “a Jew was to bring me Light.”
She faced the Emptiness about her. She metit. Emptiness? The little candle stilly laid it whole, perfect, before her. Behind her a shut door. About her Emptiness.
“—and God?”
Sudden her eyes were hard. “Think of him,” she spoke. Her mouth full of tears made her voice liquid. “Think of him. Think of him, Fanny. No one else!... Your Light-bearer, your Prophet, your Voice in the Wilderness—there he is, out there, in the arms of Thelma.... Fanny, dare to think.”
She was still. She was a little woman huddled in the Dark with hard eyes, daring to think.
Daring to see!
Her mouth tremored. Her hands reached open before her. They clasped. She drew her hands in upon her breasts: and as they pressed, her eyes blazed with anguish as if she held flame to her flesh. She pressed ... she pressed. Her face broke.... Then, from the wreckage of her features there was born a smile making them clear and sharp, making them fair and high. A Light shone in them.
1916-1921
Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:stook still=> stood still {pg 57}football thrust her=> footfall thrust her {pg 86}Take the chancet=> Take the chance {pg}106
Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:
stook still=> stood still {pg 57}
football thrust her=> footfall thrust her {pg 86}
Take the chancet=> Take the chance {pg}106