MY DEAR MRS. PAGE,—I have been wishing for some days to find the right moment in which to thank you for your kindness both to Aunt Love and me in rendering her so much assistance in coming to us. She seems happy and at home already. I am the more pleased to have secured her that it makes it easy for me, in the absence of my old housekeeper, to entertain guests during the coming eventful summer. I hope you and your husband have not already committed yourselves to another plan for seeing the Fair, for our house is most conveniently situated, and my sister and I would be pleased to have you come to us. Will you extend my invitation to your brother as well? As for Jack, it is not necessary, I am sure, for me to write a separate invitation to him. His room is ready for him, and I count upon his taking possession of it for as long a time as he can make it convenient. Indeed, I wish you all four to choose your own times and seasons for coming, for I have no plan to entertain any one else, and I beg you to consider the house always open to you, and a sincere welcome always ready.Mildred wishes me to send you her love, and we both hope soon to receive favorable word of your plans. Cordially yours,CLOVER B. VAN TASSEL.Mrs. Page, upon finishing, let her pleased gaze rove from one to another of her three companions. Jack's face was eager and happy, Gorham's interested, but her husband was the first to speak."I foresee that I am going to fall in love with that woman," he remarked, breaking open his third muffin and handing his cup to the maid for a second cup of coffee. "That is a charming letter.""Just an ordinary Chicago production," said Jack exultantly. "What do you say, old Reliable?" he added, turning toward Gorham."We are in great luck," returned the latter."Now, I will admit," said Jack, "that I have been trying to provide for us all at the Chicago Beach; but I will cease my struggles gratefully.""When do you want to go, Hilda?" asked Robert Page."When can you go, is a more pertinent question," she answered."July will, I suppose, be the best time. Would it be heresy, Jack, to inquire if the thermometer in Chicago rises above sixty-five degrees in July? I have understood that it does.""I know of no city in the country where there is no hot weather in summer," returned Jack shortly. "Chicago is, however, a summer resort.""I suppose you mean a place where summer resorts. That is what I have heard.""Perhaps you would better not risk your life there.""Tut, tut, my boy. I am going to see the writer of that whole-souled letter."Jack, who had already excused himself from the table, here left the room without deigning a reply, and Mrs. Page immediately looked toward her brother."What do you think, Gorham? Of course this is a delightful invitation, but ought we to accept it?""I don't quite see your objection," he answered."It is charming of Mrs. Van Tassel, but it is so evidently a sense of duty which impels her to give such an invitation to a mere acquaintance like me, and a stranger like Robert.""Look here," remarked the latter, looking up vaguely. "I don't think I want any flaws picked in that invitation.""Now you keep still, Robert, like a dear. You don't know her at all, and Gorham does. She is just doing this in Uncle Richard's name; I know it, and I am not willing to impose upon her.""May I see the letter once again?" asked Gorham."Certainly;" Mrs. Page handed it to him with alacrity. He read it through from beginning to end. It sounded like Clover. He could hear her pleasant voice in every phrase."She is a thoughtful, deliberate sort of person," he said as he handed the letter back. "Whatever her motive is, it is a sufficient one, and one thing that would influence me to advise you to accept is the effect on Jack. Their relations have been a little strained, and I think it would make things still pleasanter than they are now, if Mrs. Van Tassel and Miss Bryant were to become better acquainted with his people.""Yes, that is what I think," remarked Mr. Page; but his wife frowned upon him."You, and Robert, and Jack, go," continued Gorham. "I won't. That would be rather too much of a good thing; but I can get a room at the Beach Hotel, and that is near by. I propose to spend a good deal of time at the Fair. I want to go through it with some degree of thoroughness. Of course no one will really see half of it. I understand that, giving one minute to each exhibit, it is estimated that it would take thirty-two years for a man to get around."His brother groaned. He was stout and not energetic save in the matter of wholesale dry-goods."Thank Heaven it won't take thirty-two years to see Mrs. Van Tassel," he remarked devoutly.There were no doubts or scruples in Jack's mind as to accepting his invitation, at least for the present. Indeed, this reconciliation between himself and the Bryants, as he still often found himself calling his old friends, altered the whole trend of his life. He felt a new satisfaction in living; a new desire for home; a willingness which amounted to necessity to shake the dust of Boston from his feet, and once more to make of Chicago a permanent abiding-place. His sense of loneliness, an aching one still at times, abated. His own place waited for him. The friendship of these cousins, kind and helpful in their way, could never be to him like that of those girls, the only sisters he had ever known, who had so long divided with him his father's affection and care. He was going home. It was the first sensation of the sort that he had had for years.He did not try to conceal his satisfaction from Mrs. Page when he said to her hisau revoir. He expressed sincere gratitude for her kindness and hospitality, but she saw that he was not sorry to have no plan for returning to Boston, and felt a little piqued despite Jack's enthusiasm over the plan which would soon make them a reunited family party."I have not seen Jack so gay since Uncle Richard died," she said that night to Gorham."No. His alienation from Mrs. Van Tassel and her sister has worried him a good deal, I know," responded Page. "This final burial of the hatchet must be a great relief to a fellow so sensitive as Jack is."But this explanation was not sufficient to account to Mrs. Page for Van Tassel's jubilant spirits. He had not sprung up three stairs at a time, and whistled and sung over his packing, just because of obtaining the forgiveness of two young women whose feelings he had outraged."Men are stupid," she soliloquized. "I know that Jack is in love."With this truly feminine solution of her cousin's conduct she was the better satisfied because she would so soon have opportunity of verifying her own perspicacity by ocular proof. But her diagnosis would have been a surprise to Jack. No lover-like haste mingled with the impatience he felt at the lateness of his train on the June afternoon when he reached Chicago; and when finally he found himself on the familiar home street, even its unfamiliarity seemed representative of the pleasant new state of things which had come into his life. His flying visit during the bad weather of six weeks before had not shown the old neighborhood in its present finished condition.Van Tassel smiled as a coach and six rattled by him, the notes of its "mellow horn" breaking in impertinently upon the strains of an orchestra at the adjacent fashionable hotel. "Can this be quiet little Hyde Park?" he asked himself.How the long June evenings of his boyhood came back to him as he sauntered down the changed street! How the thrushes used to sing here at this hour! How the boys and girls who could muster anything to navigate, from a scow to a trim canoe or sailboat, used to launch their craft, early in these long evenings, and sometimes lashing the boats together, a dozen in a row, would drift over the rocking waves and sing by the hour beneath a moon which electricity had not yet forced out of a long-established business!The wild shore was changed, cultivated, and trimmed into order according to fashion now, like the young people who once disported over it in free country fashion.Jack could not whistle the scrap from "Carmen" against the insistent rhythm of "After the Ball" which was being performed by a uniformed functionary from the hotel who passed him under the old familiar elms.But Clover was on the piazza to meet him, a gracious genius of home in her blue gown, with the welcoming light in her eyes."I told you not to stay for me," said Jack, coming up the steps, his hat in his hand."I know," returned Clover, looking down into his happy, handsome face. "I stayed for my own sake as well as yours. I have been at the Fair all day, and did not feel like going down this evening. Mildred went from town with the Ogdens on their drag to take supper in Old Vienna. She wished me to give you an extra shake of the hand for her.""Thank you, Clover," he answered, and he held her hand a moment as they interchanged a look that had in it reminiscence, but reminiscence from which all bitterness was gone. The sweet summer air seemed throbbing with their love for him with whom every part of this home was connected.Miss Berry appeared at the house door. She started at the pretty tableau she saw, and the pure white Christmas when she pleaded for this woman with a heart-sore man passed like a vision across the fair June scene.She would have withdrawn, but Van Tassel saw her. "How do you do, Aunt Love?" he said, and then she came forward to return his cordial greeting."Isn't this a queer thing, for me to be in Chicago, Mr. Jack?""It is just as it should be," he returned. "Now when we get Gorham and Mr. and Mrs. Page here, we shall be a complete party.""Mr. and Mrs. Page promise me July," said Clover, "but your cousin Gorham seems to think he would better stay at the hotel. We won't quarrel with him at this distance." She smiled. "Well, Jack, will you go upstairs? Is it to be hammock or Fair this evening?""I can scarcely wait till to-morrow for the Fair, yet I don't like to leave you at once.""Don't mind that. I should enjoy seeing your first view, and should have saved myself for to-night except that I could not escape personally conducting a friend to-day who was very kind to us last year.""Come in and eat something first, Mr. Jack," said Miss Berry, so anxiously that Van Tassel laughed."I am sure, Aunt Love, if I have the good luck to meet you in heaven, the first thing you will do will be to urge upon me some manna or angel's food, or whatever may be on the bill of fare.""Hush, child. Come straight in, for daylight is precious.""Thank you, but I knew that, and so I took lunch in the train. I expected only to carom on the house as it were, and then make a bee-line for the great show. We did have the first view of it together, Clover, you know."The dimple dipped in Clover's cheek just as of old. "It will seem different to you to-night," she answered. "That was impressive and solemn; but now— No, I won't be so foolish as to try to describe what is incomparable. I will only say, Go. You will be grateful for whatever feeble standards of comparison you have gained by travel."CHAPTER XV.THE COURT OF HONOR.Jack jumped into a Beach wagon as it rolled along from the hotel, and drove down East End Avenue, approaching the gigantic failure known as the Spectatorium, whose bulky, half-clothed skeleton upreared against the sky like a type of blighted hope.Following Clover's advice, he entered the Park at the Fifty-seventh Street entrance. A band was playing on its aerial perch above the Eskimo village, and Jack smiled to hear the gay, assured strains of "After the Ball" soaring above a vigorous drum accompaniment. He walked across the bridge and looked down where the Eskimos in their white robes with the peaked hoods propelled their slender canoes noiselessly amid the darkening shadows of the willows.Straight before him to Michigan's brink stretched an electric-lighted avenue, flanked on one side by State buildings, and on the other by that lion-guarded Greek Palace of Art whose columns, even pictured, send a thrill of grateful delight to the hearts of those who have passed within its portals.The fresh verdure of the lawns showed living green, as Jack passed on to the right until he gained the waterside of the Art Building, and there paused to gaze across at the edifices on the opposite shores. Towers and domes of all shapes and sizes showed amid the June foliage. Every beauty of form and tint surrounded him, divided by broad spaces of rippling water. He was in a city of preternatural loveliness. What wonder that a noiseless boat came gliding to his feet in answer to his wish to explore these distant, fairy vistas. He stepped within, and silently the little craft sped on.The white loveliness of Brazil, the alabaster lace work of the poetical Fisheries,—Van Tassel glanced over his shoulder as they were left behind, and in a minute more the lofty, winged angels of the Woman's Building blessed his sight.The dainty conceits of Puck and the White Star melted from his vision to make way for the glories of the Horticultural treasure house, surmounted by its illuminated crystal dome. Lilies, red, yellow, and white, were asleep in the stone-guarded lakelet, upon which smiled the wreathed marble beauty of women and babies on the façade; and in contrast, next sprang to life in electric light the alert equestrian figures of cowboy and Indian controlling restive steed, and peering forth into the night.But an exclamation escaped Van Tassel's lips as the Transportation Building was passed, and the arched grandeur of the Golden Door shone down upon him. The launch turned, and thus ideally, without sound or effort, he was borne on between Wooded Island and the homes of Mines and Electricity, approaching the vast expanse of the Liberal Arts building, only to turn smoothly again beneath the bridge, and glide on toward that Mecca of all Exposition pilgrims, the unique Court of Honor.Jack had stood there once in a still, chill time of waiting, and had seen the dead marble city quickened to life. Now the heart which began to beat that day had made all the whiteness to glow. He forgot to breathe as, passing beneath the last bridge, he emerged where the sea horses reared wildly above cascades that went splashing down the stone steps beneath Columbia's triumphal barge.Through pink and purple, the rippling opaline water in the Grand Basin was losing its sunset hues, and paling, as the fairy boat passed on. The gold of the statue of the Republic was turning to silver. The figures on the snowy palaces that faced the four sides of the lagoon still stood white against the darkening background. Angels poised on soft, strong wings, seemed vivified as the day died. Jack saw their beckoning hands through a mist. He heard the penetrating tones of their silver trumpets through the lingering sweetness of a serenade that proceeded from a distant pavilion. Strange influences were about him, and he was glad that no mortal friend stood by.His father had worked and planned and striven for this. Did he see the result? Could he know the success that had crowned the efforts of his confreres?Suddenly, across the spontaneous regret that sprang in Jack's heart at the realization of what Death had snatched from his loved one, came an idea which was like a glimpse of new light. Since such a miracle of beauty as now lay about him was possible in this lower world, might it not be indeed true—Jack's thoughts became confused. They had followed so long and yearningly out into that unknown country where his father had gone, and about which he had never before troubled himself, that he had grasped for his own consolation a belief that it was a reality; and now something in this stately and beautiful place built with men's hands made him recall vaguely the Bible declaration:—"Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him."It was with reverence and a species of awe that Van Tassel gazed about him. The Court of Honor had given him his first approach to a realization of the possibilities of the Celestial City.Only gradually the details of his surroundings impressed him. His boat glided toward the Peristyle, and he began to notice that the water was picturesque with gondolas, propelled by their bright-sashed oarsmen.Beneath a massive arch he could look out upon the great lake, his lake, his old playmate, now grown grandly alien as guardian of this mystical city. He knew every tone of its voice. He had braved it in its stormy strength, and gone to sleep at night to its lullaby.Now its surf, breaking against the outer stones, appealed to his moved heart in the song of a past gone forever, and he did not know whether its proximity, the voice of this single friend in a place of strangers, gave the crown of pain or of joy to his tender ecstasy.And now the royal palaces so lavishly decorated with painting and sculpture began to assume their further nightly decoration of jewels. Tiny incandescent lights ran swiftly in diamond necklaces and diadems about cornice and pediment of buildings, and glittered in long lines close above the waters of the lagoon. The crown of the Administration dome shone out in immobile fire, while torches of flame, "yellow, golden, glorious," flared across its façades.Van Tassel had no well-meant descriptions of this view to contend against. No one had endeavored to prepare him for what he was to see. To him these wonders were appearing for the first time; one after another spontaneous, unexpected change of scene forming acrescendoof loveliness. More and more unreal grew the fairy spectacle. Less and less did he try to realize the impossible fact that he was in a familiar locality.He left the boat mechanically because his quiet fellow-passengers—figures also of a dream—did so; and when he paused again, he was standing near a giant horse and plowboy near the water's edge. Behind him stretched the spaces of lawn in front of the Liberal Arts edifice, softly green in the rays of many arc-light moons. He gazed westward toward the Administration Building, before which three great fountains played, and suddenly its regal jeweled dome became more splendid in the surrounding darkness. The cameos upon its surface shone out clear-cut and white in the night. A moment thus, then the carving disappeared, and again the electric jewels stood alone against the sky. That magic, all-revealing light flitted to rest upon the great central fountain where the Muses propelled the barge of Progress through musically plashing waters; and while the erect figure in the chair of state still looked proudly out into the night, all other brightness faded. Even the jewels vanished. The palaces stood dark and mysterious beneath the stars. All at once a light was thrown upon the group which surmounted the Peristyle.Columbus in his four-horse chariot shone white above the shadowy columns, driving in from the broad waters toward distant, glowing, advancing Columbia.Van Tassel, spellbound, yielded still more to the mystery of the place and hour, and a subdued murmur caused him to glance again westward. The fountains which flanked the great barge on either side had ceased to play, while a strange beam of light shot heavenward from either one. At last at the foot of the beam a bright liquid bubbling began, which seemed to gather strength, and at last leaped from both fountains high in air. This vivid red changed to violet, to gold, to emerald, to molten silver, breaking in brilliant showers and mists. Apart from the lofty middle jet in each one, circled low whirls of bright water with such swiftness as to stand like sheaves of wheat placed in a ring about the central cascade.Van Tassel wished to have a fairer view of both fountains, and changed his position to another side of the great horse. Around him were other shadowy beings whom he did not regard. Near his new standpoint and rather in his way was a woman seated. He did not look to see upon what she sat. In his present state of mind he would have supposed it a throne had he thought about it at all; but he did not think about it, and the throne was in his way, so he unconsciously leaned slightly upon it in his effort to see.The figure in the chair turned her head. "Did you find them?" she asked, then added coldly, "Excuse me," and turned back again.Van Tassel started like a somnambulist wakened from sleep. Another familiar voice had spoken to him out of the past. At the same moment the search light which had been upon the Quadriga sped to the angel above the pediment of the Agricultural Building. So light her poise, so strong her wings, so beneficent her outstretched arms, it seemed impossible in that mystical irradiation that she should not quit her lightly touched support and float downward to waiting mortals.A need for sympathy upsprang in Van Tassel's heart. Involuntarily he spoke:—"Is that not beautiful, Mildred?""Jack!" The exclamation in amazed tones as the girl sat up alertly in her wheeled chair. "I was just wondering if you had come. When did you arrive?"He took the hand she offered. "I don't know," he answered slowly. "Do you see that angel?""Indeed I do. That is my angel.""Our angel then. Let me share it.""You shall," replied the girl generously. She waited a moment in smiling silence; "but that isn't our hand," she added at last. "That is mine. Haven't you had it a good while, considering it is a loan?""Have I? Well," and Jack slowly released it."I am in dreamland, Mildred. I am glad to meet you here, whether you are a reality or not.""Oh! You remind me of those creepy shades in Vedder's picture where one asks the other who he is and the second answers shiverily that he doesn't know. 'I only died last night,' is what he was inconsiderate enough to reply. I have never forgiven him."Jack stood at her side and leaned an arm on the back of her chair."This is a sort of No Man's Land too," he answered, "and when it grows dark here one feels that these marble creatures gain life. See that population on the Peristyle! They belong here. We are only strangers.""I see the spell of the White City is upon you, else you would certainly express some surprise at finding me alone.""It is only one of the good and wonderful things that have befallen me to-night. It seems perfectly natural. I needed you, Mildred. I needed some tie to the time in which life was worth living to assure me that it is so still, and that there is perhaps more use in it than there would be in sinking into the opal water and dying rapturously in this enchanted place.""Why Jack, kindred spirit; you have it as severely as we have!"The girl extended her gloved hand impetuously, and Van Tassel accepted it with alacrity."Are you going to take it away again immediately?" he inquired, slowly waking to the situation. "I was enjoying holding it before more than I realized until I was bereft. One must have sympathy in a place like this.""Oh I know it," she said, speaking hastily as she withdrew her hand and looked over her shoulder apprehensively, "and I am afraid every second that Mr. Ogden will come back. When our party left Old Vienna, we separated and promised to rendezvous by the plow-horses,Ithought, but Mr. Ogden understood that it was to be at the Liberal Arts entrance, and he has gone now to see if they are there. My chair-boy is over yonder resting his weary bones on the steps. I never can endure to have the poor things stand around any more than they have to.""I trust the Liberal Arts entrance is a sufficiently ambiguous term to detain our friend some time," returned Jack. "Isn't there some white magic that could be practiced on him? Of course no black art would be possible here, but I must say I should have to come down by easy stages before I could converse with Ogden to-night, and I don't want to leave you.""I don't want you to, either. I—I especially don't. And I told Mr. Ogden that if we met you here I should have to go with you— Yes, I put it that way, for I told him we expected you, and it wasn't quite the thing for me to come away; but of course I hadn't the least idea weshouldmeet you.""And you told him that too, I suppose," remarked Jack dryly, all his dreaminess departed. "You declared it would be your duty to go with me if we did meet, but of course such a calamity for Ogden was improbable. I know just how you put it. Girls know how to smooth a man the right way. Now that we have met, and Ogden is out of the way, you tell me you especially want me to remain with you, and don't want him."Mildred looked up at the speaker, and after a moment burst into a mirthful laugh."Where is our angel?" she asked.Jack glanced across the lagoon, but all was shadow save for the rosy glow in the colonnade of the Agricultural Building."Vanished!" exclaimed Mildred. "Frightened back by your naughty temper just as she was about to fly down to us.""I don't like to think of you as the least bit of a coquette," said Van Tassel."Then don't. It is extremely disrespectful. Oh, Mr. Ogden, you are back again. The unexpected always happens, you see, and truth is stranger than fiction. Here is Mr. Van Tassel, after all.""Well, Jack." The two men greeted each other, each endeavoring to conceal his dissatisfaction. "It is possible to find a needle in the haymow, then," said Ogden. "Miss Bryant told me you were expected about now. Your first visit? What do you think of our little show?""Can't say yet," returned Jack shortly. "I am just going to see another part of it.""The fireworks, I suppose. They will start, now the fountains have stopped.""Fireworks? No!" exclaimed Van Tassel in genuine repugnance. What sacrilege for pyrotechnics to paint the lily! His eyes fell upon a revolving globe of light inside a window of the Electricity Building. Its color changed with each revolution. "I think I will wander over in that direction," he said."The fireworks are always fine," remarked Mildred. "Are you sure you would not prefer to come to the lake shore and see them? The reflections in the water give beautiful effects." As she spoke, the girl left her wheeled-chair."Oh, don't rise, Miss Bryant," begged Ogden hastily. "I will find our pusher. The rest of the party did understand that we were to come to the Liberal Arts entrance. They will meet us at Baker's Chocolate House.""Don't let me detain you," said Van Tassel courteously. The electric jewels were again running in lines of light around the buildings. Jack could see the expression in Mildred's face as she stood before him.She waited a moment and Ogden stepped aside to find the guide."I don't want to see a rocket go sputtering over this place," explained Jack, for the girl's eyes demanded something.She gave a short laugh. "You poor, provincial Bostonian," she remarked. "Go your way; and when you discover what the fireworks of the White City really are, perhaps your fastidiousness will not be shocked. Certainly, Mr. Ogden, I am ready.Au revoir, Jack.""Good-by, old fellow," said Ogden, as Mildred resumed her position in the chair. He was beaming again with relief from the apprehended loss of Miss Bryant's society.Van Tassel moved away in the opposite direction from that they took: but no amount of attempted concentration on his surroundings would restore to him the dreamy delight of half an hour ago. He saw continually the reproach and surprise in Mildred's eyes."What right had I to take her away from Ogden?" his thoughts protested. "It was all nonsense for her to think that hospitality demanded it."Then his reflections passed over from the indignant hazel eyes to Miss Bryant's cavalier. The latter's uneasy devotion had been apparent even in the few phrases Jack had heard him say. The eagerly bent head, the short nervous laughs with which he interspersed his sentences told the story: and instantly curiosity leaped up in Van Tassel's heart as to Mildred's real sentiments toward her admirer.She had said she especially wanted Jack not to leave her to-night. What did that mean? Jack walked a little faster because he suddenly knew that it was the fact that she had said that, coupled with Ogden's lover-like manner which had made him hold aloof.He had made a point of giving Ogden his chance, and now he felt ashamed of it. Why should he have felt injured because Mildred had a lover? Probably she had a dozen, and what wonder if she had?He felt humiliated, and convicted of disloyalty. Milly Bryant had wanted defense from something, and had appealed to him in vain.Jack had passed along the side of the Electrical Building and crossed the bridge to Wooded Island by this time, and, deciding to postpone further exploration, determined to walk straight up through the Cornell Avenue entrance and go home. But as thousands of people, know to the cost of their groaning muscles, getting on Wooded Island and getting off it are two very different things. Jack wandered about for some time before he found another bridge, and when he did so, it led off to the east, and his aimless walk brought him to the lake shore. Cannon-like reports were sounding upon the air, and superb bombs bursting high above the water broke into lavish showers of emeralds, rubies, and diamonds. The shore was black with a watching multitude, and Van Tassel found himself drawn to its outskirts to watch and wonder with the rest. Volcanoes and serpents of flame, bouquets of a hundred rockets at once, filled the night with brightness, paling the stars, and illuminating the surging water; and when a succession of fiery white cascades slowly unrolled their graceful curves and stood poised in air, showering a light as of day upon the scene, Jack joined in the cheers that, with whistles from a congregation of boats saluted the gorgeous spectacle."I'm a fool," he said, as he resumed his walk northward. "I am sure Mildred would have given me her hand again on that."CHAPTER XVI.A MASSACHUSETTS CELEBRATION."I see by the paper there's some sort o' doin's at the Massachusetts house to-day," observed Miss Berry to Clover, as the two stood in the dining-room one morning after breakfast was over."A day when you ought to visit the Fair then, surely," replied her companion."Why, yes. I don't know but I will," returned Miss Lovina ruminatively."And you ought to make an early start, Aunt Love. You are not the only loyal Yankee in town.""Just so," said the housekeeper placidly. "Mrs. Van Tassel, we must have a chocolate puddin' pretty soon. Mr. Jack was fond o' chocolate from a child. I well remember"—"Yes, I want to hear all about it some time; but you know how hard it is for you to get an early start for the Fair. Let me attend to your department to-day, and you go down to the Massachusetts house and have a good time.""My dear, I shall get there in good season. Don't you worry a mite. Independence is won. The country's safe and my bein' on hand at just such a minute don't signify. I'd rather go through my reg'lar routine. I'm happier that way."Thus it was that when Aunt Love stepped leisurely through the Cornell Avenue turnstile, taking her way down between Kentucky and West Virginia and around Pennsylvania's edifice, she saw that the Massachusetts Building was surrounded by a crowd."That's clever," she murmured, in nowise disturbed by the evident fact that she could not approach near enough to hear the speeches. "There's plenty o' folks to show an interest."The wreathed façade of New York's palatial home rose beside her, and she ascended the broad marble steps, passed through the hall, and out upon the eastern porch. A fountain plashed coolly in its centre, wicker rocking-chairs stood about, dull blue portières were looped between its pillars. Miss Berry was warm and tired from her walk. The chairs looked inviting. She sank into one of them, and listened to the lulling tone of the fountain while she looked across the street at the more energetic patriots or more curious idlers, who lined the way to the Hancock house in the hope of seeing the dignitaries of the occasion pass in and out.A fine band stationed in the yard of the mansion began to play inspiringly. As Miss Berry grew refreshed under the influence of the silvery falling water and her comfortable chair, her anxiety to see and hear increased. Her point of view was unsatisfactory, and yet the idea of joining the crowd of spectators was not attractive."I wonder if they'll let you go upstairs in this grand, big place," she pondered. "One o' those blue fellers'll stop me quick enough if I can't. They know a good deal better what a body can't do than what she can."Miss Berry might be excused for grumbling. She had made her acquaintance with the Fair City at a date before the Columbian Guards had learned their points of compass; and she would have to become lighter on her feet before she could forgive them the unnecessary walking which their blundering directions had caused her to perform.She left the shady stone porch, and, passing through the spacious apartment which led to the hall, began to ascend the stairs. No one protested, and she took courage to remark her surroundings."The New Yorkers seem to like any color so it's red," she mused, noting the Pompeian glow of the wall. Of course a Massachusetts woman on this day must not be uncritical of her neighbor's efforts.But when Miss Lovina entered the banquet hall she stood amazed. Only for a moment, however. It was an unrighteous place. She felt it. She refused to be dazzled by its prismatic glass and its painted cherubs. There was an unholy luxury, a theatrical suggestion about its velvet boxes. Miss Berry, looking straight before her, hastened swiftly as she dared across its polished floor and through the light room beyond, out upon an upper balcony which overlooked the festivities of her own substantial and respectable State.Yes, Miss Berry could breathe out here. Coming from the seductive shadow of the dim hall, the sunlight seemed doubly clear. The heavenly blue of the firmament bent above snowy and golden domes, flying flags, and winding waterways, while the bewitching sparkle of Lake Michigan's electric blues and peacock greens seemed more vital as one listened to the rhythmic harmonies poured forth on the summer air by the musicians below. It was a season of delight. The whole atmosphere seemed charged with gayety.A man leaning his elbows on the rail of the balcony was thinking this when Miss Lovina emerged from the doorway. She glanced at him, then glanced again, then gazed."Of course 't ain't him; but if it don't look like him!" she mused.The more she looked, the stronger grew the resemblance of that back to one she knew. The man was interested in the celebration over the way. Why should she not stand beside him a minute?Acting on the impulse, Aunt Love also leaned her arm on the rail, and waited a second before stealing a furtive curious look at her neighbor's face. Their eyes met. In a moment both her hands were being shaken."For the land's sake, Mr. Gorham!""Hurrah for us," he answered, laughing. "To think that I should have come unexpectedly upon this celebration and you. What more could a Bostonian ask?""You might ask to be in the Massachusetts house instead of over here in Gotham.""I fancy only invited guests go in there to-day; but at any rate I have only just arrived, and this is a fine place for the general effect. So that is the old Hancock house.""Yes. I remember the real one very well.""How well the grounds look. I am anxious to get in. You have visited it, of course.""Yes, I have. I must say to you, Mr. Gorham, I had to laugh to see some o' the stuff they've put in a glass case over there. I've got some things in my attic in Pearfield they could have had and welcome.""Perhaps they would have been glad of them," remarked Page.Miss Berry laughed. "I never thought before o' puttin' Aunt Jerushy's old calash under glass for a show," she said. "It would 'a' looked simple to me; but there's papers in one o' the downstairs rooms that are interestin'. There's no doubt about it. It does make a body's blood boil to see the old superstitions down in black and white, and think o' the past sufferin's of innocent folks. There's one paper there makin' out a case against some poor critter for havin' dealin's with the devil, 'way back in Salem times.""I want to see everything in that house," returned Gorham, with anticipatory relish."Well, give an account of yourself," said Miss Berry, after a moment's silence. "Have you been to Mrs. Van Tassel's?""No, not yet.""But you are comin', ain't you?""To call, certainly.""But you've been invited to stay?""Yes, I know; but I have taken a room at the Beach.""Why, what's that for? Mrs. Van Tassel will think that's queer.""She will have guests enough without me.""It is your Uncle Richard's house," persisted Miss Berry."Yes, that is just the trouble," returned Page quietly.Aunt Love sighed. "Well, I was 'lottin' on helpin' to make you all comfortable.""I haven't a doubt of it, you dear soul. Be sure that only stern principle drives me from under your wing, and please get me an invitation to dinner soon, won't you? How is Jack?""He's lively. I heard 'em at breakfast talkin' about all comin' down to the illumination tonight.""I wonder if I might join the party.""Of course. Nobody knew you were comin' out so soon.""I didn't expect it myself. It was a sudden determination.""They are goin' to have their supper down here at six o'clock, I heard 'em say at breakfast, at the Marine—Caffy, I think they call it. At any rate I know the house first-rate; and if 't wan't for the Art Buildin' I could show it to you from here. It's brown, and that's queer enough in this place, and then it's all covered with candle snuffers. Just as soon as I once sensed it that the Columbian Guards were put here to look pretty and didn't know where anything was, I made up my mind if I didn't learn the g'ography o' the place I'd be a cripple; so I buckled down to it and I'm most ready to stand an examination. Miss Bryant told me when I first came down that if I'd just take the opposite direction to what a Guard told me, I'd find myself all right; and that did work pretty well, but it's better yet to know your own way around and not have to make calculations."Page nodded smilingly."It does beat all," Aunt Love went on, "how when you're at this north end o' the Fair, the Art Buildin' is just across the street from everything. It does seem sometimes as if it hadn't any end; and when you once get into it. My!""Yes, I suppose so," said Page, "but," he added with the courage of a new-comer, "I propose to see all that's in it; and speaking of thoroughness, have you looked over this building?""I just glanced as I came along," replied Miss Berry cautiously. "It's pretty worldly and glitterin', just like the folks that built it. That hall in there with the slippery floor"—"A ball-room, yes. Let us go back and examine.""Oh, it's a ball-room, is it!" said Miss Berry, following the young man back into the lofty apartment where sunlight sifting through caught in the prismatic chandeliers and lay in rainbows on the floor.They stood at the rope-guarded door of the dainty tea-room. Page pointed out to his companion the beauties of wreathed pillars and mural decorations in the lofty hall, but he observed that the light of suspicion still shone in her eyes."Let us try the roof, Aunt Love," he remarked. "You can see the Hancock house again from there, and I'm sure you will be more comfortable.""Oh, I know this is all elegant, Mr. Gorham, and it's a great thing to have such riches opened up for everybody to see. Why, downstairs there's a gold piano, and velvet and silk curtains; but folks don't want to set their hearts on gold pianos and diamond chandeliers. You ain't goin' to take that elevator, are you?" she added, dropping her virtuously impersonal tone for one of anxiety."Certainly. You must have learned the importance of economizing steps here.""Better get lame from walkin' than break your leg in a fallin' elevator," remarked Miss Berry. "Accidents in the papers do scare a body." But she consented to run the risk, and soon was standing beside Page in one of the square towers on the roof, with the Fair City spread out around them."I suppose you have visited the Midway," remarked Page, looking over to where the Ferris wheel revolved, slowly and steadily.Miss Berry threw up both her hands. "Yes, all I want to," she returned sonorously."Don't say that. I expect you to pilot me to all the shows.""You'll be disappointed, then. Civilization's good enough for me. If I'd had a call to minister to naked savages, I s'pose I'd 'a' been given grace to conquer; but to listen to 'em yell, and see 'em dance, is a mighty queer thing for Christians to seek for entertainment, it seems to me. If I could go into that Pleasance with plenty o' hot water and Castile soap, and some sensible clothes, and could help those poor critters to a more godly way o' livin' that would be a different thing; but when I want a good time I ain't goin' to try to get it bein' trod on by camels and yelled at by Turks, all the time smellin' smells I don't know the name of and would be afraid to. No, sir."Page laughed. Miss Berry looked as though Michigan's breezes were powerless to cool her."Perhaps the Midway Plaisance is an acquired taste," he said. "You may like it better, later.""No, I've seen enough of it if I can't be a missionary, but I'm glad all the natives have got it warm at last, anyway.""Which natives?""Oh, all those foreign folks. They're all natives of some place, I s'pose, and they do say when 't was rainy and cold and muddy they had a forlorn time of it in the Pleasance.""Yes; we used to read about it, and my brother Robert nicknamed the street then the Mudway Nuisance. We all laughed at the joke but Jack. It is against Jack's principles to jest at sacred things like Chicago and her Fair. I shall have to get him to show me the fine points of the Midway. He won't refuse me.""No, indeed. There's plenty that like it. The place gets more crowded every day. Why, Mr. Gorham," Miss Berry dropped her rather sad, musing tone, and spoke feelingly. "That Midway is just a representation of matter, and this great White City is an emblem of mind. In the Midway it's some dirty and all barbaric. It deafens you with noise; the worst folks in there are avaricious and bad, and the best are just children in their ignorance, and when you're feelin' bewildered with the smells and sounds and sights, always changin' like one o' these kaleidoscopes, and when you come out o' that mile-long babel where you've been elbowed and cheated, you pass under a bridge—and all of a sudden you are in a great, beautiful silence. The angels on the Woman's Buildin' smile down and bless you, and you know that in what seemed like one step, you've passed out o' darkness into light." Aunt Love paused thoughtfully. "It's come to me, Mr. Gorham, that perhaps dyin' is goin' to be somethin' like crossin' the dividin' line that separates the Midway from the White City. I've asked myself when I've passed under that bridge and felt the difference down so deep, what did make it so strong? 'T ain't only the quiet and the grandeur o' those buildin's compared with the fantastic things you've left behind; I believe it's just the fact that the makers o' the Fair believed in God and put Him and their enlightenment from Him into what they did; and we feel it some like we'd feel an electric shock."Page nodded. "You make me more interested than ever in my prospect of sightseeing," he said. "Now I propose that you show me the way to that café where you say the others will come this evening, and we will take lunch together there. Not a word of objection, Aunt Love. This is a great day. United we stand, divided we fall. Let us charge on the café under the candle-snuffers."The two friends descended to the street, and Page, submitting to Miss Berry's guidance, was led through the archway running beneath the eastern corridor of the Art Building. "I won't attempt to take you through the buildin' itself," said Miss Berry, "'cause I know well enough I shouldn't get you through before the middle o' the afternoon; partly 'cause you'd stop to look at the statuary, and partly 'cause the first thing I always do when I get in there is to lose myself. I've thought, up to this summer, that I had a pretty good bump o' locality; but land! let me turn around in that place a few times and all those signs, 'East Wall,' 'North Wall,' and the rest, don't mean any more to me than Greek would. You'll see how 't is when you try it."Page was only half listening. He paused by the brink of the water, fascinated by the sparkling, shining, noonday beauty before him. Gondolas were stealing from beneath the bridges, and electric launches passing and repassing silently and smoothly over the changing waves."We must get into one of those boats, Aunt Love," he said with enthusiasm."You can't sail to the restaurant. That's right over yonder," observed Miss Berry practically, indicating with her parasol the many-towered roof of the Marine Café.Page sighed. "Do what you like with me," he answered resignedly. "I can see already that the summer will be too short.""If your breath ain't, that's all you need fret about," returned Miss Lovina, as they started eastward, along the bank of the pond. "Many's the time in the last weeks I've wished I only weighed one hundred. Don't those ducks and swans have it comfortable?"Page watched the undulating motions of the pretty birds that eyed them as they passed."No, I didn't bring my lunch; hadn't the least notion o' stayin'," replied Miss Berry over her shoulder, to the graceful followers who soon veered away, secure of dining sumptuously every day."These here steps," remarked Aunt Love, as she climbed up to Costa Rica's entrance and down on the other side, "do seem an awful aggravation when you're tired, which I ain't now, of course. There's no gettin' out of 'em except by walkin' all around Robin Hood's barn."Page found his companion surprisingly intelligent as to the names of the buildings they passed lingeringly on the way to the café, and once arrived at that haven, they proceeded to take a leisurely lunch, after which Miss Berry allowed herself to be easily persuaded to ride around the lagoon in an electric launch.Page found so much to interest him in this initial trip, the quiet gliding motion, cool air, and constantly stimulating panorama were so charming, that he scarcely knew when to abandon this certain good for one more doubtful. At last, however, he and Miss Berry found themselves roaming beneath the gilded towers of the Electricity Building. Miss Lovina gazed benevolently and uncomprehendingly upon one and another evidence of marvelous achievement, waiting patiently whenever Page paused to examine and question."There's one place here," she volunteered at last, "where I will say for 'em they've done a cute thing. They've harnessed chain lightnin' so it pulls up and down a zigzag path just as tame as my cow'll go to pasture. Come and see it, Mr. Gorham."So Page was piloted through the spectacular southeast portion of the building, where color and movement thrilled through every phase of intensity, from the steady glow of the living green pillars of the Egyptian temple, to the various whirling globes and wheels, and the racing bubbles of changing light which sped along their irregular tracks."Ah, here are the telephones," remarked Page."Yes; do you know, Mr. Gorham, till I came to Chicago I'd never seen a telephone? I find folks don't make anything of 'em here. Mrs. Van Tassel ain't any more afraid of her telephone than she is of her sewin' machine. When I first came I used to jump a foot every time that sharp little bell rung; but I made up my mind that I was havin' advantages, and that I wasn't goin' to slight 'em. I made up my mind I was goin' to speak into that box, no matter how fast the chills traveled up my back, and I did it; it makes me as weak as a kitten yet, but I just will be up with the times I live in if I get a chance; and ain't a telephone a perfect wonder now?""It is, indeed, and they are improving them all the time. I see there is a long-distance telephone. How should you like to talk to New York?""I shouldn't like to make a fool o' myself that way or any other, Gorham Page.""But really, Aunt Love"—"Save your breath, Mr. Gorham. I know this buildin's full o' queer doin's and it's a good place to play jokes on a body, but there's limits to even a greenhorn's credulity.""I was never more in earnest, I assure you. It is possible to talk to New York."Miss Berry regarded her companion severely. "Then it's blasphemous. That's all I've got to say.""Why, I don't see that.""Do you s'pose the Lord would have put New York a thousand miles away from Chicago if he'd expected 'em to talk to each other?"Page laughed. "I never thought of that before as a reason for the antagonism between the two cities. Nonsense, Aunt Love; the world moves, and you must move with it. You shall speak to New York and be proud of yourself ever afterward. You know it is to be expected that science will do everything possible toward annihilating space."Page ascended the steps toward a silk-curtained cabinet; a uniformed boy opened its glass door.After remaining in the closet a minute and speaking a few sentences into the telephone, he beckoned to Miss Berry who had remained standing at the foot of the steps looking very apprehensive."Now, Aunt Love," he said encouragingly, as she slowly approached, a do-or-die expression on her face. Had Miss Berry been of the Romish church instead of being a "Con'regationalist in good and regular standing," she would assuredly have crossed herself before entering that tasteful little apartment.Page smiled into his mustache as he placed the receiver in her hand, fervently wishing that he might hear both sides of the impending dialogue."Mr. Gorham," said Miss Berry, addressing him over her shoulder impressively, "think of the miles, the hours, I traveled; the rivers and lakes I crossed; the mountains I tunneled"—"Yes, yes, Aunt Love; but don't keep our New York friend waiting.""I feel prickly, Gorham. I think I'm goin' to faint.""Oh no, you're not. Just say Hello," returned Page cheerily, his eyes twinkling."Hello," quavered Miss Lovina, and promptly the answer came:—New York. Is this Miss Berry?Miss Berry. How did you know my name?New York. A gentleman just told me to expect you. I am happy to meet you, or to hear you, all the way from New York.Miss Berry. Go away!New York. Aren't you a little unreasonable, madam? I'm a good way off already.Miss Berry. How am I to be sure you ain't in the next room, sir?New York. Do you hear me so distinctly?Miss Berry. It is the most wonderful thing in the world if you are real.New York. Oh, I am real, I assure you, madam. I see you have been making trips to the Midway, and your confidence in human nature is shaken.Miss Berry. You're just right there. I should like to talk to you about the Midway. Have you been to the Fair yet?New York. No; and alas, I'm afraid I'm not coming; but if I do, I'm going to the Midway the first thing.Miss Berry. Now, young man, you just stand there a minute, and I'll convince you—"Hey?" for Gorham was pulling her sleeve."There are some more people waiting to speak, Aunt Love.""What? Oh," Miss Berry looked dazed, relinquished the receiver, and moved like a somnambulist out of the cabinet."You might have said good-by to your new friend," suggested Page."Mr. Gorham, tell me," spoke Aunt Love beseechingly. "If I was ever good to you, if you ever liked my cookies, tell me the truth. Was that all hocus-pocus, or was it genuine?""Why, it was genuine, Aunt Love. It is done every day in business.""Well," Miss Berry stepped off energetically. "All is, then, I've capped the climax o' my life. I don't calc'late to ever call anything wonderful again."But she did. Page took her upstairs to the gallery where a door opened by magic when her foot touched the threshold; where the tel-autograph reproduced a writer's chirography while transmitting his thoughts; where a metal rod, passing along a person's spine, caused blue flames to leap forth, crackling and spitting in Mephistophelean fashion, a cure which Miss Berry thought worse than any known disease. She saw there, too, the smallest steam-engine in the world, reposing its miniature perfection in a walnut shell, and displaying its exquisite mechanism only beneath a magnifying glass.But the cooking of food and the hatching of chickens by electricity appealed to Aunt Love so engrossingly that, after repeated vain efforts to woo her away from both these attractions, Page finally took his leave of her there, and his parting view showed Miss Berry gazing through the side of an incubator where chicks were in every stage of existence, from the first thrust of a yellow beak through the eggshell, to the freed and bedraggled little wretch whose sole aim in life seemed to be to half hop and half tumble across the incubator until its wet body rested directly upon an incandescent light. These eventful journeys, with their apparently suicidal goal, so absorbed Miss Berry that she could do little more than wave her hand after Page as he set briskly off for pastures new.
MY DEAR MRS. PAGE,—I have been wishing for some days to find the right moment in which to thank you for your kindness both to Aunt Love and me in rendering her so much assistance in coming to us. She seems happy and at home already. I am the more pleased to have secured her that it makes it easy for me, in the absence of my old housekeeper, to entertain guests during the coming eventful summer. I hope you and your husband have not already committed yourselves to another plan for seeing the Fair, for our house is most conveniently situated, and my sister and I would be pleased to have you come to us. Will you extend my invitation to your brother as well? As for Jack, it is not necessary, I am sure, for me to write a separate invitation to him. His room is ready for him, and I count upon his taking possession of it for as long a time as he can make it convenient. Indeed, I wish you all four to choose your own times and seasons for coming, for I have no plan to entertain any one else, and I beg you to consider the house always open to you, and a sincere welcome always ready.
Mildred wishes me to send you her love, and we both hope soon to receive favorable word of your plans. Cordially yours,
CLOVER B. VAN TASSEL.
Mrs. Page, upon finishing, let her pleased gaze rove from one to another of her three companions. Jack's face was eager and happy, Gorham's interested, but her husband was the first to speak.
"I foresee that I am going to fall in love with that woman," he remarked, breaking open his third muffin and handing his cup to the maid for a second cup of coffee. "That is a charming letter."
"Just an ordinary Chicago production," said Jack exultantly. "What do you say, old Reliable?" he added, turning toward Gorham.
"We are in great luck," returned the latter.
"Now, I will admit," said Jack, "that I have been trying to provide for us all at the Chicago Beach; but I will cease my struggles gratefully."
"When do you want to go, Hilda?" asked Robert Page.
"When can you go, is a more pertinent question," she answered.
"July will, I suppose, be the best time. Would it be heresy, Jack, to inquire if the thermometer in Chicago rises above sixty-five degrees in July? I have understood that it does."
"I know of no city in the country where there is no hot weather in summer," returned Jack shortly. "Chicago is, however, a summer resort."
"I suppose you mean a place where summer resorts. That is what I have heard."
"Perhaps you would better not risk your life there."
"Tut, tut, my boy. I am going to see the writer of that whole-souled letter."
Jack, who had already excused himself from the table, here left the room without deigning a reply, and Mrs. Page immediately looked toward her brother.
"What do you think, Gorham? Of course this is a delightful invitation, but ought we to accept it?"
"I don't quite see your objection," he answered.
"It is charming of Mrs. Van Tassel, but it is so evidently a sense of duty which impels her to give such an invitation to a mere acquaintance like me, and a stranger like Robert."
"Look here," remarked the latter, looking up vaguely. "I don't think I want any flaws picked in that invitation."
"Now you keep still, Robert, like a dear. You don't know her at all, and Gorham does. She is just doing this in Uncle Richard's name; I know it, and I am not willing to impose upon her."
"May I see the letter once again?" asked Gorham.
"Certainly;" Mrs. Page handed it to him with alacrity. He read it through from beginning to end. It sounded like Clover. He could hear her pleasant voice in every phrase.
"She is a thoughtful, deliberate sort of person," he said as he handed the letter back. "Whatever her motive is, it is a sufficient one, and one thing that would influence me to advise you to accept is the effect on Jack. Their relations have been a little strained, and I think it would make things still pleasanter than they are now, if Mrs. Van Tassel and Miss Bryant were to become better acquainted with his people."
"Yes, that is what I think," remarked Mr. Page; but his wife frowned upon him.
"You, and Robert, and Jack, go," continued Gorham. "I won't. That would be rather too much of a good thing; but I can get a room at the Beach Hotel, and that is near by. I propose to spend a good deal of time at the Fair. I want to go through it with some degree of thoroughness. Of course no one will really see half of it. I understand that, giving one minute to each exhibit, it is estimated that it would take thirty-two years for a man to get around."
His brother groaned. He was stout and not energetic save in the matter of wholesale dry-goods.
"Thank Heaven it won't take thirty-two years to see Mrs. Van Tassel," he remarked devoutly.
There were no doubts or scruples in Jack's mind as to accepting his invitation, at least for the present. Indeed, this reconciliation between himself and the Bryants, as he still often found himself calling his old friends, altered the whole trend of his life. He felt a new satisfaction in living; a new desire for home; a willingness which amounted to necessity to shake the dust of Boston from his feet, and once more to make of Chicago a permanent abiding-place. His sense of loneliness, an aching one still at times, abated. His own place waited for him. The friendship of these cousins, kind and helpful in their way, could never be to him like that of those girls, the only sisters he had ever known, who had so long divided with him his father's affection and care. He was going home. It was the first sensation of the sort that he had had for years.
He did not try to conceal his satisfaction from Mrs. Page when he said to her hisau revoir. He expressed sincere gratitude for her kindness and hospitality, but she saw that he was not sorry to have no plan for returning to Boston, and felt a little piqued despite Jack's enthusiasm over the plan which would soon make them a reunited family party.
"I have not seen Jack so gay since Uncle Richard died," she said that night to Gorham.
"No. His alienation from Mrs. Van Tassel and her sister has worried him a good deal, I know," responded Page. "This final burial of the hatchet must be a great relief to a fellow so sensitive as Jack is."
But this explanation was not sufficient to account to Mrs. Page for Van Tassel's jubilant spirits. He had not sprung up three stairs at a time, and whistled and sung over his packing, just because of obtaining the forgiveness of two young women whose feelings he had outraged.
"Men are stupid," she soliloquized. "I know that Jack is in love."
With this truly feminine solution of her cousin's conduct she was the better satisfied because she would so soon have opportunity of verifying her own perspicacity by ocular proof. But her diagnosis would have been a surprise to Jack. No lover-like haste mingled with the impatience he felt at the lateness of his train on the June afternoon when he reached Chicago; and when finally he found himself on the familiar home street, even its unfamiliarity seemed representative of the pleasant new state of things which had come into his life. His flying visit during the bad weather of six weeks before had not shown the old neighborhood in its present finished condition.
Van Tassel smiled as a coach and six rattled by him, the notes of its "mellow horn" breaking in impertinently upon the strains of an orchestra at the adjacent fashionable hotel. "Can this be quiet little Hyde Park?" he asked himself.
How the long June evenings of his boyhood came back to him as he sauntered down the changed street! How the thrushes used to sing here at this hour! How the boys and girls who could muster anything to navigate, from a scow to a trim canoe or sailboat, used to launch their craft, early in these long evenings, and sometimes lashing the boats together, a dozen in a row, would drift over the rocking waves and sing by the hour beneath a moon which electricity had not yet forced out of a long-established business!
The wild shore was changed, cultivated, and trimmed into order according to fashion now, like the young people who once disported over it in free country fashion.
Jack could not whistle the scrap from "Carmen" against the insistent rhythm of "After the Ball" which was being performed by a uniformed functionary from the hotel who passed him under the old familiar elms.
But Clover was on the piazza to meet him, a gracious genius of home in her blue gown, with the welcoming light in her eyes.
"I told you not to stay for me," said Jack, coming up the steps, his hat in his hand.
"I know," returned Clover, looking down into his happy, handsome face. "I stayed for my own sake as well as yours. I have been at the Fair all day, and did not feel like going down this evening. Mildred went from town with the Ogdens on their drag to take supper in Old Vienna. She wished me to give you an extra shake of the hand for her."
"Thank you, Clover," he answered, and he held her hand a moment as they interchanged a look that had in it reminiscence, but reminiscence from which all bitterness was gone. The sweet summer air seemed throbbing with their love for him with whom every part of this home was connected.
Miss Berry appeared at the house door. She started at the pretty tableau she saw, and the pure white Christmas when she pleaded for this woman with a heart-sore man passed like a vision across the fair June scene.
She would have withdrawn, but Van Tassel saw her. "How do you do, Aunt Love?" he said, and then she came forward to return his cordial greeting.
"Isn't this a queer thing, for me to be in Chicago, Mr. Jack?"
"It is just as it should be," he returned. "Now when we get Gorham and Mr. and Mrs. Page here, we shall be a complete party."
"Mr. and Mrs. Page promise me July," said Clover, "but your cousin Gorham seems to think he would better stay at the hotel. We won't quarrel with him at this distance." She smiled. "Well, Jack, will you go upstairs? Is it to be hammock or Fair this evening?"
"I can scarcely wait till to-morrow for the Fair, yet I don't like to leave you at once."
"Don't mind that. I should enjoy seeing your first view, and should have saved myself for to-night except that I could not escape personally conducting a friend to-day who was very kind to us last year."
"Come in and eat something first, Mr. Jack," said Miss Berry, so anxiously that Van Tassel laughed.
"I am sure, Aunt Love, if I have the good luck to meet you in heaven, the first thing you will do will be to urge upon me some manna or angel's food, or whatever may be on the bill of fare."
"Hush, child. Come straight in, for daylight is precious."
"Thank you, but I knew that, and so I took lunch in the train. I expected only to carom on the house as it were, and then make a bee-line for the great show. We did have the first view of it together, Clover, you know."
The dimple dipped in Clover's cheek just as of old. "It will seem different to you to-night," she answered. "That was impressive and solemn; but now— No, I won't be so foolish as to try to describe what is incomparable. I will only say, Go. You will be grateful for whatever feeble standards of comparison you have gained by travel."
CHAPTER XV.
THE COURT OF HONOR.
Jack jumped into a Beach wagon as it rolled along from the hotel, and drove down East End Avenue, approaching the gigantic failure known as the Spectatorium, whose bulky, half-clothed skeleton upreared against the sky like a type of blighted hope.
Following Clover's advice, he entered the Park at the Fifty-seventh Street entrance. A band was playing on its aerial perch above the Eskimo village, and Jack smiled to hear the gay, assured strains of "After the Ball" soaring above a vigorous drum accompaniment. He walked across the bridge and looked down where the Eskimos in their white robes with the peaked hoods propelled their slender canoes noiselessly amid the darkening shadows of the willows.
Straight before him to Michigan's brink stretched an electric-lighted avenue, flanked on one side by State buildings, and on the other by that lion-guarded Greek Palace of Art whose columns, even pictured, send a thrill of grateful delight to the hearts of those who have passed within its portals.
The fresh verdure of the lawns showed living green, as Jack passed on to the right until he gained the waterside of the Art Building, and there paused to gaze across at the edifices on the opposite shores. Towers and domes of all shapes and sizes showed amid the June foliage. Every beauty of form and tint surrounded him, divided by broad spaces of rippling water. He was in a city of preternatural loveliness. What wonder that a noiseless boat came gliding to his feet in answer to his wish to explore these distant, fairy vistas. He stepped within, and silently the little craft sped on.
The white loveliness of Brazil, the alabaster lace work of the poetical Fisheries,—Van Tassel glanced over his shoulder as they were left behind, and in a minute more the lofty, winged angels of the Woman's Building blessed his sight.
The dainty conceits of Puck and the White Star melted from his vision to make way for the glories of the Horticultural treasure house, surmounted by its illuminated crystal dome. Lilies, red, yellow, and white, were asleep in the stone-guarded lakelet, upon which smiled the wreathed marble beauty of women and babies on the façade; and in contrast, next sprang to life in electric light the alert equestrian figures of cowboy and Indian controlling restive steed, and peering forth into the night.
But an exclamation escaped Van Tassel's lips as the Transportation Building was passed, and the arched grandeur of the Golden Door shone down upon him. The launch turned, and thus ideally, without sound or effort, he was borne on between Wooded Island and the homes of Mines and Electricity, approaching the vast expanse of the Liberal Arts building, only to turn smoothly again beneath the bridge, and glide on toward that Mecca of all Exposition pilgrims, the unique Court of Honor.
Jack had stood there once in a still, chill time of waiting, and had seen the dead marble city quickened to life. Now the heart which began to beat that day had made all the whiteness to glow. He forgot to breathe as, passing beneath the last bridge, he emerged where the sea horses reared wildly above cascades that went splashing down the stone steps beneath Columbia's triumphal barge.
Through pink and purple, the rippling opaline water in the Grand Basin was losing its sunset hues, and paling, as the fairy boat passed on. The gold of the statue of the Republic was turning to silver. The figures on the snowy palaces that faced the four sides of the lagoon still stood white against the darkening background. Angels poised on soft, strong wings, seemed vivified as the day died. Jack saw their beckoning hands through a mist. He heard the penetrating tones of their silver trumpets through the lingering sweetness of a serenade that proceeded from a distant pavilion. Strange influences were about him, and he was glad that no mortal friend stood by.
His father had worked and planned and striven for this. Did he see the result? Could he know the success that had crowned the efforts of his confreres?
Suddenly, across the spontaneous regret that sprang in Jack's heart at the realization of what Death had snatched from his loved one, came an idea which was like a glimpse of new light. Since such a miracle of beauty as now lay about him was possible in this lower world, might it not be indeed true—
Jack's thoughts became confused. They had followed so long and yearningly out into that unknown country where his father had gone, and about which he had never before troubled himself, that he had grasped for his own consolation a belief that it was a reality; and now something in this stately and beautiful place built with men's hands made him recall vaguely the Bible declaration:—
"Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him."
It was with reverence and a species of awe that Van Tassel gazed about him. The Court of Honor had given him his first approach to a realization of the possibilities of the Celestial City.
Only gradually the details of his surroundings impressed him. His boat glided toward the Peristyle, and he began to notice that the water was picturesque with gondolas, propelled by their bright-sashed oarsmen.
Beneath a massive arch he could look out upon the great lake, his lake, his old playmate, now grown grandly alien as guardian of this mystical city. He knew every tone of its voice. He had braved it in its stormy strength, and gone to sleep at night to its lullaby.
Now its surf, breaking against the outer stones, appealed to his moved heart in the song of a past gone forever, and he did not know whether its proximity, the voice of this single friend in a place of strangers, gave the crown of pain or of joy to his tender ecstasy.
And now the royal palaces so lavishly decorated with painting and sculpture began to assume their further nightly decoration of jewels. Tiny incandescent lights ran swiftly in diamond necklaces and diadems about cornice and pediment of buildings, and glittered in long lines close above the waters of the lagoon. The crown of the Administration dome shone out in immobile fire, while torches of flame, "yellow, golden, glorious," flared across its façades.
Van Tassel had no well-meant descriptions of this view to contend against. No one had endeavored to prepare him for what he was to see. To him these wonders were appearing for the first time; one after another spontaneous, unexpected change of scene forming acrescendoof loveliness. More and more unreal grew the fairy spectacle. Less and less did he try to realize the impossible fact that he was in a familiar locality.
He left the boat mechanically because his quiet fellow-passengers—figures also of a dream—did so; and when he paused again, he was standing near a giant horse and plowboy near the water's edge. Behind him stretched the spaces of lawn in front of the Liberal Arts edifice, softly green in the rays of many arc-light moons. He gazed westward toward the Administration Building, before which three great fountains played, and suddenly its regal jeweled dome became more splendid in the surrounding darkness. The cameos upon its surface shone out clear-cut and white in the night. A moment thus, then the carving disappeared, and again the electric jewels stood alone against the sky. That magic, all-revealing light flitted to rest upon the great central fountain where the Muses propelled the barge of Progress through musically plashing waters; and while the erect figure in the chair of state still looked proudly out into the night, all other brightness faded. Even the jewels vanished. The palaces stood dark and mysterious beneath the stars. All at once a light was thrown upon the group which surmounted the Peristyle.
Columbus in his four-horse chariot shone white above the shadowy columns, driving in from the broad waters toward distant, glowing, advancing Columbia.
Van Tassel, spellbound, yielded still more to the mystery of the place and hour, and a subdued murmur caused him to glance again westward. The fountains which flanked the great barge on either side had ceased to play, while a strange beam of light shot heavenward from either one. At last at the foot of the beam a bright liquid bubbling began, which seemed to gather strength, and at last leaped from both fountains high in air. This vivid red changed to violet, to gold, to emerald, to molten silver, breaking in brilliant showers and mists. Apart from the lofty middle jet in each one, circled low whirls of bright water with such swiftness as to stand like sheaves of wheat placed in a ring about the central cascade.
Van Tassel wished to have a fairer view of both fountains, and changed his position to another side of the great horse. Around him were other shadowy beings whom he did not regard. Near his new standpoint and rather in his way was a woman seated. He did not look to see upon what she sat. In his present state of mind he would have supposed it a throne had he thought about it at all; but he did not think about it, and the throne was in his way, so he unconsciously leaned slightly upon it in his effort to see.
The figure in the chair turned her head. "Did you find them?" she asked, then added coldly, "Excuse me," and turned back again.
Van Tassel started like a somnambulist wakened from sleep. Another familiar voice had spoken to him out of the past. At the same moment the search light which had been upon the Quadriga sped to the angel above the pediment of the Agricultural Building. So light her poise, so strong her wings, so beneficent her outstretched arms, it seemed impossible in that mystical irradiation that she should not quit her lightly touched support and float downward to waiting mortals.
A need for sympathy upsprang in Van Tassel's heart. Involuntarily he spoke:—
"Is that not beautiful, Mildred?"
"Jack!" The exclamation in amazed tones as the girl sat up alertly in her wheeled chair. "I was just wondering if you had come. When did you arrive?"
He took the hand she offered. "I don't know," he answered slowly. "Do you see that angel?"
"Indeed I do. That is my angel."
"Our angel then. Let me share it."
"You shall," replied the girl generously. She waited a moment in smiling silence; "but that isn't our hand," she added at last. "That is mine. Haven't you had it a good while, considering it is a loan?"
"Have I? Well," and Jack slowly released it.
"I am in dreamland, Mildred. I am glad to meet you here, whether you are a reality or not."
"Oh! You remind me of those creepy shades in Vedder's picture where one asks the other who he is and the second answers shiverily that he doesn't know. 'I only died last night,' is what he was inconsiderate enough to reply. I have never forgiven him."
Jack stood at her side and leaned an arm on the back of her chair.
"This is a sort of No Man's Land too," he answered, "and when it grows dark here one feels that these marble creatures gain life. See that population on the Peristyle! They belong here. We are only strangers."
"I see the spell of the White City is upon you, else you would certainly express some surprise at finding me alone."
"It is only one of the good and wonderful things that have befallen me to-night. It seems perfectly natural. I needed you, Mildred. I needed some tie to the time in which life was worth living to assure me that it is so still, and that there is perhaps more use in it than there would be in sinking into the opal water and dying rapturously in this enchanted place."
"Why Jack, kindred spirit; you have it as severely as we have!"
The girl extended her gloved hand impetuously, and Van Tassel accepted it with alacrity.
"Are you going to take it away again immediately?" he inquired, slowly waking to the situation. "I was enjoying holding it before more than I realized until I was bereft. One must have sympathy in a place like this."
"Oh I know it," she said, speaking hastily as she withdrew her hand and looked over her shoulder apprehensively, "and I am afraid every second that Mr. Ogden will come back. When our party left Old Vienna, we separated and promised to rendezvous by the plow-horses,Ithought, but Mr. Ogden understood that it was to be at the Liberal Arts entrance, and he has gone now to see if they are there. My chair-boy is over yonder resting his weary bones on the steps. I never can endure to have the poor things stand around any more than they have to."
"I trust the Liberal Arts entrance is a sufficiently ambiguous term to detain our friend some time," returned Jack. "Isn't there some white magic that could be practiced on him? Of course no black art would be possible here, but I must say I should have to come down by easy stages before I could converse with Ogden to-night, and I don't want to leave you."
"I don't want you to, either. I—I especially don't. And I told Mr. Ogden that if we met you here I should have to go with you— Yes, I put it that way, for I told him we expected you, and it wasn't quite the thing for me to come away; but of course I hadn't the least idea weshouldmeet you."
"And you told him that too, I suppose," remarked Jack dryly, all his dreaminess departed. "You declared it would be your duty to go with me if we did meet, but of course such a calamity for Ogden was improbable. I know just how you put it. Girls know how to smooth a man the right way. Now that we have met, and Ogden is out of the way, you tell me you especially want me to remain with you, and don't want him."
Mildred looked up at the speaker, and after a moment burst into a mirthful laugh.
"Where is our angel?" she asked.
Jack glanced across the lagoon, but all was shadow save for the rosy glow in the colonnade of the Agricultural Building.
"Vanished!" exclaimed Mildred. "Frightened back by your naughty temper just as she was about to fly down to us."
"I don't like to think of you as the least bit of a coquette," said Van Tassel.
"Then don't. It is extremely disrespectful. Oh, Mr. Ogden, you are back again. The unexpected always happens, you see, and truth is stranger than fiction. Here is Mr. Van Tassel, after all."
"Well, Jack." The two men greeted each other, each endeavoring to conceal his dissatisfaction. "It is possible to find a needle in the haymow, then," said Ogden. "Miss Bryant told me you were expected about now. Your first visit? What do you think of our little show?"
"Can't say yet," returned Jack shortly. "I am just going to see another part of it."
"The fireworks, I suppose. They will start, now the fountains have stopped."
"Fireworks? No!" exclaimed Van Tassel in genuine repugnance. What sacrilege for pyrotechnics to paint the lily! His eyes fell upon a revolving globe of light inside a window of the Electricity Building. Its color changed with each revolution. "I think I will wander over in that direction," he said.
"The fireworks are always fine," remarked Mildred. "Are you sure you would not prefer to come to the lake shore and see them? The reflections in the water give beautiful effects." As she spoke, the girl left her wheeled-chair.
"Oh, don't rise, Miss Bryant," begged Ogden hastily. "I will find our pusher. The rest of the party did understand that we were to come to the Liberal Arts entrance. They will meet us at Baker's Chocolate House."
"Don't let me detain you," said Van Tassel courteously. The electric jewels were again running in lines of light around the buildings. Jack could see the expression in Mildred's face as she stood before him.
She waited a moment and Ogden stepped aside to find the guide.
"I don't want to see a rocket go sputtering over this place," explained Jack, for the girl's eyes demanded something.
She gave a short laugh. "You poor, provincial Bostonian," she remarked. "Go your way; and when you discover what the fireworks of the White City really are, perhaps your fastidiousness will not be shocked. Certainly, Mr. Ogden, I am ready.Au revoir, Jack."
"Good-by, old fellow," said Ogden, as Mildred resumed her position in the chair. He was beaming again with relief from the apprehended loss of Miss Bryant's society.
Van Tassel moved away in the opposite direction from that they took: but no amount of attempted concentration on his surroundings would restore to him the dreamy delight of half an hour ago. He saw continually the reproach and surprise in Mildred's eyes.
"What right had I to take her away from Ogden?" his thoughts protested. "It was all nonsense for her to think that hospitality demanded it."
Then his reflections passed over from the indignant hazel eyes to Miss Bryant's cavalier. The latter's uneasy devotion had been apparent even in the few phrases Jack had heard him say. The eagerly bent head, the short nervous laughs with which he interspersed his sentences told the story: and instantly curiosity leaped up in Van Tassel's heart as to Mildred's real sentiments toward her admirer.
She had said she especially wanted Jack not to leave her to-night. What did that mean? Jack walked a little faster because he suddenly knew that it was the fact that she had said that, coupled with Ogden's lover-like manner which had made him hold aloof.
He had made a point of giving Ogden his chance, and now he felt ashamed of it. Why should he have felt injured because Mildred had a lover? Probably she had a dozen, and what wonder if she had?
He felt humiliated, and convicted of disloyalty. Milly Bryant had wanted defense from something, and had appealed to him in vain.
Jack had passed along the side of the Electrical Building and crossed the bridge to Wooded Island by this time, and, deciding to postpone further exploration, determined to walk straight up through the Cornell Avenue entrance and go home. But as thousands of people, know to the cost of their groaning muscles, getting on Wooded Island and getting off it are two very different things. Jack wandered about for some time before he found another bridge, and when he did so, it led off to the east, and his aimless walk brought him to the lake shore. Cannon-like reports were sounding upon the air, and superb bombs bursting high above the water broke into lavish showers of emeralds, rubies, and diamonds. The shore was black with a watching multitude, and Van Tassel found himself drawn to its outskirts to watch and wonder with the rest. Volcanoes and serpents of flame, bouquets of a hundred rockets at once, filled the night with brightness, paling the stars, and illuminating the surging water; and when a succession of fiery white cascades slowly unrolled their graceful curves and stood poised in air, showering a light as of day upon the scene, Jack joined in the cheers that, with whistles from a congregation of boats saluted the gorgeous spectacle.
"I'm a fool," he said, as he resumed his walk northward. "I am sure Mildred would have given me her hand again on that."
CHAPTER XVI.
A MASSACHUSETTS CELEBRATION.
"I see by the paper there's some sort o' doin's at the Massachusetts house to-day," observed Miss Berry to Clover, as the two stood in the dining-room one morning after breakfast was over.
"A day when you ought to visit the Fair then, surely," replied her companion.
"Why, yes. I don't know but I will," returned Miss Lovina ruminatively.
"And you ought to make an early start, Aunt Love. You are not the only loyal Yankee in town."
"Just so," said the housekeeper placidly. "Mrs. Van Tassel, we must have a chocolate puddin' pretty soon. Mr. Jack was fond o' chocolate from a child. I well remember"—
"Yes, I want to hear all about it some time; but you know how hard it is for you to get an early start for the Fair. Let me attend to your department to-day, and you go down to the Massachusetts house and have a good time."
"My dear, I shall get there in good season. Don't you worry a mite. Independence is won. The country's safe and my bein' on hand at just such a minute don't signify. I'd rather go through my reg'lar routine. I'm happier that way."
Thus it was that when Aunt Love stepped leisurely through the Cornell Avenue turnstile, taking her way down between Kentucky and West Virginia and around Pennsylvania's edifice, she saw that the Massachusetts Building was surrounded by a crowd.
"That's clever," she murmured, in nowise disturbed by the evident fact that she could not approach near enough to hear the speeches. "There's plenty o' folks to show an interest."
The wreathed façade of New York's palatial home rose beside her, and she ascended the broad marble steps, passed through the hall, and out upon the eastern porch. A fountain plashed coolly in its centre, wicker rocking-chairs stood about, dull blue portières were looped between its pillars. Miss Berry was warm and tired from her walk. The chairs looked inviting. She sank into one of them, and listened to the lulling tone of the fountain while she looked across the street at the more energetic patriots or more curious idlers, who lined the way to the Hancock house in the hope of seeing the dignitaries of the occasion pass in and out.
A fine band stationed in the yard of the mansion began to play inspiringly. As Miss Berry grew refreshed under the influence of the silvery falling water and her comfortable chair, her anxiety to see and hear increased. Her point of view was unsatisfactory, and yet the idea of joining the crowd of spectators was not attractive.
"I wonder if they'll let you go upstairs in this grand, big place," she pondered. "One o' those blue fellers'll stop me quick enough if I can't. They know a good deal better what a body can't do than what she can."
Miss Berry might be excused for grumbling. She had made her acquaintance with the Fair City at a date before the Columbian Guards had learned their points of compass; and she would have to become lighter on her feet before she could forgive them the unnecessary walking which their blundering directions had caused her to perform.
She left the shady stone porch, and, passing through the spacious apartment which led to the hall, began to ascend the stairs. No one protested, and she took courage to remark her surroundings.
"The New Yorkers seem to like any color so it's red," she mused, noting the Pompeian glow of the wall. Of course a Massachusetts woman on this day must not be uncritical of her neighbor's efforts.
But when Miss Lovina entered the banquet hall she stood amazed. Only for a moment, however. It was an unrighteous place. She felt it. She refused to be dazzled by its prismatic glass and its painted cherubs. There was an unholy luxury, a theatrical suggestion about its velvet boxes. Miss Berry, looking straight before her, hastened swiftly as she dared across its polished floor and through the light room beyond, out upon an upper balcony which overlooked the festivities of her own substantial and respectable State.
Yes, Miss Berry could breathe out here. Coming from the seductive shadow of the dim hall, the sunlight seemed doubly clear. The heavenly blue of the firmament bent above snowy and golden domes, flying flags, and winding waterways, while the bewitching sparkle of Lake Michigan's electric blues and peacock greens seemed more vital as one listened to the rhythmic harmonies poured forth on the summer air by the musicians below. It was a season of delight. The whole atmosphere seemed charged with gayety.
A man leaning his elbows on the rail of the balcony was thinking this when Miss Lovina emerged from the doorway. She glanced at him, then glanced again, then gazed.
"Of course 't ain't him; but if it don't look like him!" she mused.
The more she looked, the stronger grew the resemblance of that back to one she knew. The man was interested in the celebration over the way. Why should she not stand beside him a minute?
Acting on the impulse, Aunt Love also leaned her arm on the rail, and waited a second before stealing a furtive curious look at her neighbor's face. Their eyes met. In a moment both her hands were being shaken.
"For the land's sake, Mr. Gorham!"
"Hurrah for us," he answered, laughing. "To think that I should have come unexpectedly upon this celebration and you. What more could a Bostonian ask?"
"You might ask to be in the Massachusetts house instead of over here in Gotham."
"I fancy only invited guests go in there to-day; but at any rate I have only just arrived, and this is a fine place for the general effect. So that is the old Hancock house."
"Yes. I remember the real one very well."
"How well the grounds look. I am anxious to get in. You have visited it, of course."
"Yes, I have. I must say to you, Mr. Gorham, I had to laugh to see some o' the stuff they've put in a glass case over there. I've got some things in my attic in Pearfield they could have had and welcome."
"Perhaps they would have been glad of them," remarked Page.
Miss Berry laughed. "I never thought before o' puttin' Aunt Jerushy's old calash under glass for a show," she said. "It would 'a' looked simple to me; but there's papers in one o' the downstairs rooms that are interestin'. There's no doubt about it. It does make a body's blood boil to see the old superstitions down in black and white, and think o' the past sufferin's of innocent folks. There's one paper there makin' out a case against some poor critter for havin' dealin's with the devil, 'way back in Salem times."
"I want to see everything in that house," returned Gorham, with anticipatory relish.
"Well, give an account of yourself," said Miss Berry, after a moment's silence. "Have you been to Mrs. Van Tassel's?"
"No, not yet."
"But you are comin', ain't you?"
"To call, certainly."
"But you've been invited to stay?"
"Yes, I know; but I have taken a room at the Beach."
"Why, what's that for? Mrs. Van Tassel will think that's queer."
"She will have guests enough without me."
"It is your Uncle Richard's house," persisted Miss Berry.
"Yes, that is just the trouble," returned Page quietly.
Aunt Love sighed. "Well, I was 'lottin' on helpin' to make you all comfortable."
"I haven't a doubt of it, you dear soul. Be sure that only stern principle drives me from under your wing, and please get me an invitation to dinner soon, won't you? How is Jack?"
"He's lively. I heard 'em at breakfast talkin' about all comin' down to the illumination tonight."
"I wonder if I might join the party."
"Of course. Nobody knew you were comin' out so soon."
"I didn't expect it myself. It was a sudden determination."
"They are goin' to have their supper down here at six o'clock, I heard 'em say at breakfast, at the Marine—Caffy, I think they call it. At any rate I know the house first-rate; and if 't wan't for the Art Buildin' I could show it to you from here. It's brown, and that's queer enough in this place, and then it's all covered with candle snuffers. Just as soon as I once sensed it that the Columbian Guards were put here to look pretty and didn't know where anything was, I made up my mind if I didn't learn the g'ography o' the place I'd be a cripple; so I buckled down to it and I'm most ready to stand an examination. Miss Bryant told me when I first came down that if I'd just take the opposite direction to what a Guard told me, I'd find myself all right; and that did work pretty well, but it's better yet to know your own way around and not have to make calculations."
Page nodded smilingly.
"It does beat all," Aunt Love went on, "how when you're at this north end o' the Fair, the Art Buildin' is just across the street from everything. It does seem sometimes as if it hadn't any end; and when you once get into it. My!"
"Yes, I suppose so," said Page, "but," he added with the courage of a new-comer, "I propose to see all that's in it; and speaking of thoroughness, have you looked over this building?"
"I just glanced as I came along," replied Miss Berry cautiously. "It's pretty worldly and glitterin', just like the folks that built it. That hall in there with the slippery floor"—
"A ball-room, yes. Let us go back and examine."
"Oh, it's a ball-room, is it!" said Miss Berry, following the young man back into the lofty apartment where sunlight sifting through caught in the prismatic chandeliers and lay in rainbows on the floor.
They stood at the rope-guarded door of the dainty tea-room. Page pointed out to his companion the beauties of wreathed pillars and mural decorations in the lofty hall, but he observed that the light of suspicion still shone in her eyes.
"Let us try the roof, Aunt Love," he remarked. "You can see the Hancock house again from there, and I'm sure you will be more comfortable."
"Oh, I know this is all elegant, Mr. Gorham, and it's a great thing to have such riches opened up for everybody to see. Why, downstairs there's a gold piano, and velvet and silk curtains; but folks don't want to set their hearts on gold pianos and diamond chandeliers. You ain't goin' to take that elevator, are you?" she added, dropping her virtuously impersonal tone for one of anxiety.
"Certainly. You must have learned the importance of economizing steps here."
"Better get lame from walkin' than break your leg in a fallin' elevator," remarked Miss Berry. "Accidents in the papers do scare a body." But she consented to run the risk, and soon was standing beside Page in one of the square towers on the roof, with the Fair City spread out around them.
"I suppose you have visited the Midway," remarked Page, looking over to where the Ferris wheel revolved, slowly and steadily.
Miss Berry threw up both her hands. "Yes, all I want to," she returned sonorously.
"Don't say that. I expect you to pilot me to all the shows."
"You'll be disappointed, then. Civilization's good enough for me. If I'd had a call to minister to naked savages, I s'pose I'd 'a' been given grace to conquer; but to listen to 'em yell, and see 'em dance, is a mighty queer thing for Christians to seek for entertainment, it seems to me. If I could go into that Pleasance with plenty o' hot water and Castile soap, and some sensible clothes, and could help those poor critters to a more godly way o' livin' that would be a different thing; but when I want a good time I ain't goin' to try to get it bein' trod on by camels and yelled at by Turks, all the time smellin' smells I don't know the name of and would be afraid to. No, sir."
Page laughed. Miss Berry looked as though Michigan's breezes were powerless to cool her.
"Perhaps the Midway Plaisance is an acquired taste," he said. "You may like it better, later."
"No, I've seen enough of it if I can't be a missionary, but I'm glad all the natives have got it warm at last, anyway."
"Which natives?"
"Oh, all those foreign folks. They're all natives of some place, I s'pose, and they do say when 't was rainy and cold and muddy they had a forlorn time of it in the Pleasance."
"Yes; we used to read about it, and my brother Robert nicknamed the street then the Mudway Nuisance. We all laughed at the joke but Jack. It is against Jack's principles to jest at sacred things like Chicago and her Fair. I shall have to get him to show me the fine points of the Midway. He won't refuse me."
"No, indeed. There's plenty that like it. The place gets more crowded every day. Why, Mr. Gorham," Miss Berry dropped her rather sad, musing tone, and spoke feelingly. "That Midway is just a representation of matter, and this great White City is an emblem of mind. In the Midway it's some dirty and all barbaric. It deafens you with noise; the worst folks in there are avaricious and bad, and the best are just children in their ignorance, and when you're feelin' bewildered with the smells and sounds and sights, always changin' like one o' these kaleidoscopes, and when you come out o' that mile-long babel where you've been elbowed and cheated, you pass under a bridge—and all of a sudden you are in a great, beautiful silence. The angels on the Woman's Buildin' smile down and bless you, and you know that in what seemed like one step, you've passed out o' darkness into light." Aunt Love paused thoughtfully. "It's come to me, Mr. Gorham, that perhaps dyin' is goin' to be somethin' like crossin' the dividin' line that separates the Midway from the White City. I've asked myself when I've passed under that bridge and felt the difference down so deep, what did make it so strong? 'T ain't only the quiet and the grandeur o' those buildin's compared with the fantastic things you've left behind; I believe it's just the fact that the makers o' the Fair believed in God and put Him and their enlightenment from Him into what they did; and we feel it some like we'd feel an electric shock."
Page nodded. "You make me more interested than ever in my prospect of sightseeing," he said. "Now I propose that you show me the way to that café where you say the others will come this evening, and we will take lunch together there. Not a word of objection, Aunt Love. This is a great day. United we stand, divided we fall. Let us charge on the café under the candle-snuffers."
The two friends descended to the street, and Page, submitting to Miss Berry's guidance, was led through the archway running beneath the eastern corridor of the Art Building. "I won't attempt to take you through the buildin' itself," said Miss Berry, "'cause I know well enough I shouldn't get you through before the middle o' the afternoon; partly 'cause you'd stop to look at the statuary, and partly 'cause the first thing I always do when I get in there is to lose myself. I've thought, up to this summer, that I had a pretty good bump o' locality; but land! let me turn around in that place a few times and all those signs, 'East Wall,' 'North Wall,' and the rest, don't mean any more to me than Greek would. You'll see how 't is when you try it."
Page was only half listening. He paused by the brink of the water, fascinated by the sparkling, shining, noonday beauty before him. Gondolas were stealing from beneath the bridges, and electric launches passing and repassing silently and smoothly over the changing waves.
"We must get into one of those boats, Aunt Love," he said with enthusiasm.
"You can't sail to the restaurant. That's right over yonder," observed Miss Berry practically, indicating with her parasol the many-towered roof of the Marine Café.
Page sighed. "Do what you like with me," he answered resignedly. "I can see already that the summer will be too short."
"If your breath ain't, that's all you need fret about," returned Miss Lovina, as they started eastward, along the bank of the pond. "Many's the time in the last weeks I've wished I only weighed one hundred. Don't those ducks and swans have it comfortable?"
Page watched the undulating motions of the pretty birds that eyed them as they passed.
"No, I didn't bring my lunch; hadn't the least notion o' stayin'," replied Miss Berry over her shoulder, to the graceful followers who soon veered away, secure of dining sumptuously every day.
"These here steps," remarked Aunt Love, as she climbed up to Costa Rica's entrance and down on the other side, "do seem an awful aggravation when you're tired, which I ain't now, of course. There's no gettin' out of 'em except by walkin' all around Robin Hood's barn."
Page found his companion surprisingly intelligent as to the names of the buildings they passed lingeringly on the way to the café, and once arrived at that haven, they proceeded to take a leisurely lunch, after which Miss Berry allowed herself to be easily persuaded to ride around the lagoon in an electric launch.
Page found so much to interest him in this initial trip, the quiet gliding motion, cool air, and constantly stimulating panorama were so charming, that he scarcely knew when to abandon this certain good for one more doubtful. At last, however, he and Miss Berry found themselves roaming beneath the gilded towers of the Electricity Building. Miss Lovina gazed benevolently and uncomprehendingly upon one and another evidence of marvelous achievement, waiting patiently whenever Page paused to examine and question.
"There's one place here," she volunteered at last, "where I will say for 'em they've done a cute thing. They've harnessed chain lightnin' so it pulls up and down a zigzag path just as tame as my cow'll go to pasture. Come and see it, Mr. Gorham."
So Page was piloted through the spectacular southeast portion of the building, where color and movement thrilled through every phase of intensity, from the steady glow of the living green pillars of the Egyptian temple, to the various whirling globes and wheels, and the racing bubbles of changing light which sped along their irregular tracks.
"Ah, here are the telephones," remarked Page.
"Yes; do you know, Mr. Gorham, till I came to Chicago I'd never seen a telephone? I find folks don't make anything of 'em here. Mrs. Van Tassel ain't any more afraid of her telephone than she is of her sewin' machine. When I first came I used to jump a foot every time that sharp little bell rung; but I made up my mind that I was havin' advantages, and that I wasn't goin' to slight 'em. I made up my mind I was goin' to speak into that box, no matter how fast the chills traveled up my back, and I did it; it makes me as weak as a kitten yet, but I just will be up with the times I live in if I get a chance; and ain't a telephone a perfect wonder now?"
"It is, indeed, and they are improving them all the time. I see there is a long-distance telephone. How should you like to talk to New York?"
"I shouldn't like to make a fool o' myself that way or any other, Gorham Page."
"But really, Aunt Love"—
"Save your breath, Mr. Gorham. I know this buildin's full o' queer doin's and it's a good place to play jokes on a body, but there's limits to even a greenhorn's credulity."
"I was never more in earnest, I assure you. It is possible to talk to New York."
Miss Berry regarded her companion severely. "Then it's blasphemous. That's all I've got to say."
"Why, I don't see that."
"Do you s'pose the Lord would have put New York a thousand miles away from Chicago if he'd expected 'em to talk to each other?"
Page laughed. "I never thought of that before as a reason for the antagonism between the two cities. Nonsense, Aunt Love; the world moves, and you must move with it. You shall speak to New York and be proud of yourself ever afterward. You know it is to be expected that science will do everything possible toward annihilating space."
Page ascended the steps toward a silk-curtained cabinet; a uniformed boy opened its glass door.
After remaining in the closet a minute and speaking a few sentences into the telephone, he beckoned to Miss Berry who had remained standing at the foot of the steps looking very apprehensive.
"Now, Aunt Love," he said encouragingly, as she slowly approached, a do-or-die expression on her face. Had Miss Berry been of the Romish church instead of being a "Con'regationalist in good and regular standing," she would assuredly have crossed herself before entering that tasteful little apartment.
Page smiled into his mustache as he placed the receiver in her hand, fervently wishing that he might hear both sides of the impending dialogue.
"Mr. Gorham," said Miss Berry, addressing him over her shoulder impressively, "think of the miles, the hours, I traveled; the rivers and lakes I crossed; the mountains I tunneled"—
"Yes, yes, Aunt Love; but don't keep our New York friend waiting."
"I feel prickly, Gorham. I think I'm goin' to faint."
"Oh no, you're not. Just say Hello," returned Page cheerily, his eyes twinkling.
"Hello," quavered Miss Lovina, and promptly the answer came:—
New York. Is this Miss Berry?
Miss Berry. How did you know my name?
New York. A gentleman just told me to expect you. I am happy to meet you, or to hear you, all the way from New York.
Miss Berry. Go away!
New York. Aren't you a little unreasonable, madam? I'm a good way off already.
Miss Berry. How am I to be sure you ain't in the next room, sir?
New York. Do you hear me so distinctly?
Miss Berry. It is the most wonderful thing in the world if you are real.
New York. Oh, I am real, I assure you, madam. I see you have been making trips to the Midway, and your confidence in human nature is shaken.
Miss Berry. You're just right there. I should like to talk to you about the Midway. Have you been to the Fair yet?
New York. No; and alas, I'm afraid I'm not coming; but if I do, I'm going to the Midway the first thing.
Miss Berry. Now, young man, you just stand there a minute, and I'll convince you—"Hey?" for Gorham was pulling her sleeve.
"There are some more people waiting to speak, Aunt Love."
"What? Oh," Miss Berry looked dazed, relinquished the receiver, and moved like a somnambulist out of the cabinet.
"You might have said good-by to your new friend," suggested Page.
"Mr. Gorham, tell me," spoke Aunt Love beseechingly. "If I was ever good to you, if you ever liked my cookies, tell me the truth. Was that all hocus-pocus, or was it genuine?"
"Why, it was genuine, Aunt Love. It is done every day in business."
"Well," Miss Berry stepped off energetically. "All is, then, I've capped the climax o' my life. I don't calc'late to ever call anything wonderful again."
But she did. Page took her upstairs to the gallery where a door opened by magic when her foot touched the threshold; where the tel-autograph reproduced a writer's chirography while transmitting his thoughts; where a metal rod, passing along a person's spine, caused blue flames to leap forth, crackling and spitting in Mephistophelean fashion, a cure which Miss Berry thought worse than any known disease. She saw there, too, the smallest steam-engine in the world, reposing its miniature perfection in a walnut shell, and displaying its exquisite mechanism only beneath a magnifying glass.
But the cooking of food and the hatching of chickens by electricity appealed to Aunt Love so engrossingly that, after repeated vain efforts to woo her away from both these attractions, Page finally took his leave of her there, and his parting view showed Miss Berry gazing through the side of an incubator where chicks were in every stage of existence, from the first thrust of a yellow beak through the eggshell, to the freed and bedraggled little wretch whose sole aim in life seemed to be to half hop and half tumble across the incubator until its wet body rested directly upon an incandescent light. These eventful journeys, with their apparently suicidal goal, so absorbed Miss Berry that she could do little more than wave her hand after Page as he set briskly off for pastures new.