The letter postmarked "New York," announcing Hamlen's arrival, did not take Huntington by surprise, but it fulfilled his expectations sooner than he expected. The desirability of making certain changes in investments, the letter explained, made it necessary for Hamlen to come to the States, and if his classmate's invitation to Boston still held good he would be glad to avail himself of the opportunity to renew their friendship.
This announcement found Huntington in the introspective mood which had alarmed Cosden, and suggested a comparison in which he placed himself under the microscope for a mercilessly minute analysis. Hamlen was convinced that he had made a failure of life, but what had he, Huntington demanded of himself, accomplished which could entitle him to claim success? He had not separated himself from his fellow-men, it was true, he had been a decent citizen, performing such duties as came to him with faithfulness and ability,—yet what had he really contributed to the community or to the life in which he lived which made it better because he had been a part of it? He had created nothing, nor even made an effort to create. Nopainting bore his signature; no volume added his contribution to the world's knowledge on any subject; no philanthropic or business enterprise owed its inception to his initiative; no child of his was growing up to bear its share in the struggle of to-morrow or to bless his memory for parental sacrifice and guidance. Hamlen at least had given himself to the world in the wonderful volumes which would live after him, even though their creator's identity never was disclosed. Hamlen at least had made the flowers and the shrubs of his island estate bear witness to the power within him which refused to be restrained; but Huntington's labors, if he could dignify them by so serious a name, had been perfunctory at best. He was rich in the world's goods and in human friendships, he was respected by all who knew him. For what? he demanded: because his grandfather and his father before him had created, and had played their part so well in the developing life of the city of their birth that a luster had been given to the family name. His virtues were wholly negative; his was a reflected glory and undeserved. The position in the community which Huntington knew himself to occupy, and the fact that Hamlen, because of his exile, would be considered to have forfeited his position, struck him as a commentary on the value of popular esteem and the lack of proportion in accrediting to each individual what was his proper due.
Hamlen had nothing to his credit in the columns where Huntington scored heaviest: he was a poor citizen in his relations to those around him; he took no part in making others happier for his companionshipor stronger by his example; his life had always been pointed inward, and yet, even with the limitations needlessly imposed upon it, there had been something within him, which Huntington had never felt within himself, great enough and strong enough to rise superior to these limitations, to burst the bonds by which Hamlen had sought to hold it back, and to force the expression of its own individuality! There, at least, was something positive; and yet the world would have called Huntington a success and Hamlen a failure! "We have torn off the bandages too fast," Huntington had complacently told Hamlen on that eventful first visit. Was it not presumption on his part when until now his own vision had been equally restricted? Huntington's first impulse was to make a frank admission, when Hamlen arrived, of the wide divergence between what people credited to him and what his real position ought to be; then he realized that his friend needed some one to look up to. He must, for a time at least, accept the position, however ironical it seemed; but he felt himself an impostor and a fraud.
Since his return home Huntington had been more than ever grateful for the diverting influence of Billy's irresponsibility, and he encouraged him to come frequently to the house and to bring his friends with him. He would not have believed that a two months' absence could produce so momentous a change of his entire viewpoint. The calm tranquillity in his mental equipoise was seriously disturbed, and he welcomed anything which took his mind off himself and his personal affairs.
He had urged Billy to bring young Thatcher into dine with him, for in view of what Marian had said he hoped that Hamlen and the boy would make good with each other when once they met. Thus far Billy had always selected an evening when Huntington was engaged, but with the certainty that Hamlen would soon arrive a special effort produced a mutually convenient date, and the two boys appeared eager for their dinner and obviously ready to be entertained.
Philip Thatcher carried himself better than his friend, and seemed older. His work on the crew had developed his frame and given him a poise which does not come to those college students who watch athletic sports from the side-lines. He had represented his university in competition, and this responsibility showed itself to his advantage. Those same "animal spirits" which gave Billy his boyish manner found a natural outlet, in Philip's case, during the hours of physical athletic training. His face was more his father's than like Mrs. Thatcher's; yet at times Huntington discovered expressions or mannerisms resembling his sister, which was enough to add to the interest he had already taken in the boy.
"Hello, Uncle Monty!" Billy announced their arrival. "We've come in to eat ourselves out of shape."
When this operation had been performed, and the coffee period took them back to the library, Huntington settled down to the real purpose of the evening.
"Philip," he said, "there is a man coming to visit me next week whom I want you to know andwho wants to know you. He is an unusual character. I wish you would show him something of what Harvard life is to-day, and when you get acquainted tell me what you think of him."
"I should be glad to meet any friend of yours, Mr. Huntington," the boy answered.
"He has a greater claim on you than simply as my friend," Huntington continued. "He was also a friend of your mother's, years ago, and while we were in Bermuda he showed us all a great deal of attention. He lives there."
"You mean that Hamlen chap?" Billy asked. "Is he really coming here? He's a dead one!"
"Don't let Billy's remarks prejudice you, Philip," Huntington urged. "Hamlen is a classmate of mine who has passed through some unfortunate experiences. He has lived by himself ever since he graduated, seeing hardly any one, and he will find much that is unusual when he returns to Boston and Cambridge after his long exile. He is a real man, Philip, and I want you to help me bring him back into the present again. Will you do it?"
"I'll try,—gladly," was the hearty answer. "It sounds like a pretty big contract, but if I can really help I shall be glad to do it."
"I know you will," Huntington said; "I was sure of it."
"Why don't you ask me?" Billy demanded. "Why go out of the family?"
"You may come into it later, but I want his first impressions to be favorable."
"Stung!" Billy cried, laughing. "But I don't care. I don't care what happens now, for Phil hasasked me to spend the Easter recess with him in New York, and I shall see Merry again."
"So it is still 'Merry,' is it?" Huntington asked, looking at him with an expression which any one other than a boy would have noticed. "By this time I thought there might have been a dozen others."
"Merry is still the one best bet," Billy insisted. "Phil here doesn't know what a cinch it is to have a sister like that."
"I believe it's because of Merry that you like me," Phil declared, half seriously.
"Well," Billy said guardedly, "it may have been the fact that you were her brother that first attracted me—"
"Why, you never saw her until we'd known each other several months—"
"We were acquainted before that," was the admission; "but I really came to know you after you introduced me to her. That, Phil, was the best thing you ever did. It was after I met Merry that I discovered that you were the finest old scout in the world."
"You make me tired!" Philip answered disgustedly. "I never saw any one so crazy over a girl. There are lots of other things in the world, Billy, besides girls. I'd hate to think of getting engaged up and having to train around with just one girl all my life."
"That's because you can't marry Merry,—she's your sister."
"I don't make any exceptions,—Merry's just a girl, like the rest of them."
"You don't appreciate her, that's all."
"Oh, Merry is all right, of course. She and I have always been good pals, and we've played together like two boys. She'd make any one a good wife if he didn't mind being bossed."
Huntington listened to the tilt between the boys with amusement, and yet with a real feeling of envy. What riches these youths possessed with life all before them, its mysteries still unexplained, its illusions still unshattered!
"I thought your sister the finest girl I ever met," he said to Philip, curious to see what response the boy would make.
"Oh, she wouldn't show that side to you," Philip replied; "it's only with people her own age."
Huntington winced. There it was again, and again he had brought it upon himself! To these boys he seemed an antique fossil of humanity, entitled to respect and veneration! He must appear the same to her. "People of her own age,"—of course, that was the natural thing as it would appear to any one. Again he cursed himself inwardly for being fool enough deliberately to open up the wound.
Billy was delighted to hear his uncle's comment on the girl, and beamed contentedly.
"You see, Phil," he said, "even Uncle Monty noticed what a corker she is, and usually he never looks at a girl twice. Uncle Monty is a cynic on marriage, a woman-hater and all that sort of thing. Yet even he noticed Merry."
"Don't say that, Billy!" Huntington protested with unusual vehemence.
"But you are," the boy insisted. "The lasttime I dined here with you and Mr. Cosden, before you went to Bermuda, I heard you tell him that many a married man who seemed contented was only resigned."
"That doesn't mean that I'm a 'woman-hater'; I won't stand for it! Be careful what you say!"
Billy looked at him in amazement. It was a rare thing to see his uncle ruffled.
"I beg your pardon, Uncle Monty," he apologized. "I didn't intend to bump any one's feelings. Truly I wasn't joshing at all,—I thought you meant it! But I'm glad you didn't, for now you'll be more sympathetic with me, and you can help me a lot."
"All right, boy," Huntington said soberly. "I know you didn't mean anything by what you said, but marriage is a mighty sacred thing and you ought not to speak lightly of it."
"How's Mr. Cosden?" Billy asked, eager to get the conversation onto safer grounds.
"Well and happy; he dined with me last week."
"Say, but he can ride a bicycle!—What did he have against me down at Bermuda?"
"He said you covered too much territory."
"I don't see where I got in his way, but he was forever butting in on Merry and me. And the way he hustled me off in that little speed-boat! I never had any one take such an interest in my getting back to college on time! That must have cost him quite a bit of kale. I can't understand it."
"It was because he is so good a friend of mine," Huntington explained. "He saw a youngster down there who flopped around like a big St. Bernard pup"—Huntingtonwas gratified that his memory still retained Merry's simile,—"and he served the best interests of his friend by keeping you from making a mistake on your latest flop. Doesn't that clear things up?"
"As clear as mud," Billy grunted. "I guess I need one of those glass-bottomed boats they use down there to see the spinach and the gold-fish. I could see the gold-fish all right, but the spinach was on me.—That reminds me, Uncle Monty, will you lend me a hundred dollars?"
"For what, this time?"
"I want to lend it to Phil,—he's broke because his father has cut down his allowance."
"Billy!" Philip cried aghast; "I told you that in confidence. I wouldn't think of borrowing money from Mr. Huntington."
"How in the world do you expect to get a hundred dollars out of me unless I land Uncle Monty for it?—and he asked, 'for what?' You heard him."
"It's all right, Phil," Huntington said reassuringly. "Billy doesn't have any secrets from me because he can't keep them. I would much rather lend the money to you than to him."
"That isn't fair," Billy protested. "Phil is sure to pay it back, and I need it."
"I don't know what has happened," Philip explained without paying any attention to what his friend was trying to say, "but all of a sudden Dad wrote that I must cut my expenses in two. That's a hard thing to do in a minute, and I don't see why I should do it anyway, for Dad has all kinds of money."
"These are hard times in Wall Street, my boy," Huntington answered him, "and many a rich man's son has to cut his corners. If your father has written you that I advise you to follow his instructions. He isn't a man to say it unless he means it.—I'll gladly help you out while you're getting adjusted."
"Thank you, Mr. Huntington, but perhaps I won't need it. Even cut in two my allowance is bigger than most of the boys'."
"Fathers are so inconsiderate," Billy yawned; "very few of them understand their sons."
"A paraphrase of the old saw, Billy," Huntington commented. "To-day we would say that it is a wise stock which knows its own par."
"Or a wise corn which knows its own popper," laughed Billy.
"Or a wise beast which knows its own fodder," Philip added,—"now we're all even!"
"Speaking of fodder," Billy said, showing renewed signs of life, "let's go down to the Copley-Plaza and get something to eat."
"After the dinner you ate?" Huntington demanded.
"That was over two hours ago, and I'm as hollow as a tin can. Come on, Phil."
"You can't be serious, Billy," insisted Huntington.
"I sure am. Whenever I get a real square feed I have a pain, and to-night I've felt perfectly comfortable."
"All right, go on if you feel that way," his uncle replied. "Take him away, Phil, and let him stuff himself until he has a pain! I'll let you know whenHamlen arrives, and then I'll count on you to help me out.
"Better include me," Billy insisted.
"The next time I ask you to dine with me, young man, I'll thank you to get filled up at the hotel first!"
The Stevenses, brother and sister, lived together in the old family mansion in Washington Square. The income from the property left behind by the elder members of the family would have been ample if Richard had contributed even a modest amount as a result of his daily exertion; but as exertion had never proved one of Ricky's strong points, except in opposition to his sister's efforts to bully him into business, Edith was forced to practise many economies to make the divided sum serve her requirements.
"If you ever showed half the ability after you got into business that you do in keeping out of it, you'd make a howling success," she told him; yet in spite of her perennial resentment she made many personal sacrifices to enable her brother to lead his aimless existence. They were a curious combination of selfishness and generosity, each going to extremes in both. Each criticised the other in unstinted terms, yet underneath it all lay an affection which would have carried either through fire and brimstone had the other required it.
Richard Stevens still kept up his social activities, but Edith moved in a smaller and quieter circlemade up of old-time friends. She knew she could not compete, in these days of extravagant entertainment, and unless she could repay her social obligations in kind she preferred not to accept. She could not have everything she wished, so she selected what she believed contributed most to her happiness and peace of mind. All this had been carefully considered, and having been thus settled she philosophically accepted conditions as they were. She exacted much from her brother by way of attention, and he responded willingly, still finding ample leisure outside her demands to live his own life in a manner which satisfied himself.
It was the morning after one of Richard's off nights, when Edith sat leisurely finishing her late breakfast and reading the head-lines in the morning paper, that her brother put in his belated appearance.
"Morning, Ricky," she greeted him cheerfully. "Up for all day?"
"I think so," was the doubtful answer. "I'm awfully tired. I'd have been down sooner except that I couldn't decide whether to stay in bed until lunchtime and give up my breakfast, or get up and have my breakfast and give up my rest. Even now I believe I made a mistake, for I'm awfully tired and I don't feel hungry."
"You might go back to bed again," Edith suggested helpfully.
"No; I'm dressed now, and that would be too much trouble.—I think I'll make my breakfast off a jolly little bottle of Célestin."
Edith laughed. "Too much wine last night, Ricky?"
Stevens made a wry face. "I'll have to give up dancing or drinking, one or the other," he said emphatically; "it isn't scientific. Wine should be allowed to stand in the stomach just as it ought to stand in the bottle. This idea of churning it up by dancing is all wrong. I'd rather dance while I'm dancing and drink while I'm drinking; but every one else wants to do both things at the same time. It's all wrong.—That Célestin has a beastly bad taste this morning." He examined the bottle critically. "I was afraid the maid had brought me Hunyadi by mistake."
"I was in at Marian's yesterday," Edith remarked. "Mr. Hamlen has arrived, and she expects Philip and Billy Huntington at the house over Easter."
"Has Hamlen been there yet? He's a melancholy sort,—about as cheerful as a hearse. Feeling as I do this morning I think I'd rather like to see him; but I hope to feel better soon."
"No; he hasn't been there yet. Marian tried to get him out for dinner, but some other friends were to dine with her so he wouldn't come."
"He's a queer one,—but that reminds me: that Cosden man is in town."
"He is?" Edith exclaimed, arresting her coffee-cup on its way to her lips and poising it in mid-air. "Why didn't you tell me before?"
"I couldn't until now; it was only yesterday I saw him. He was much more civil than in Bermuda. Wanted to know about you and all that sort of thing. He's going to telephone you before he goes back."
"Very kind of him, I'm sure," Edith sniffed. "Perhaps I'll be in and perhaps I won't."
"Well that's your affair; you needn't see him on my account. But if you were to ask me, I'd say he's not such a bad sort."
"I didn't ask you, Ricky," Edith said significantly, and Stevens, with precedent to guide him, refrained from further discussion of the topic.
Yet in spite of the snap in her eyes when she commented on Cosden's inquiry it so happened that she was in when he telephoned, and she was also at home, arrayed in her most fetching afternoon gown, when he called an hour later. Not that he would notice whether she wore gingham or alpaca, she told herself, but she owed it to her self-respect to appear her best.
She had expected to see Cosden in his business suit with bulky contracts and other papers bulging from his pockets, rushing in and out again like a hurricane; but instead she beheld him entirely at his ease in cutaway and silk hat, with immaculate grey spats over his patent-leather boots. He carried himself with an air quite different from that she had become familiar with in Bermuda, and the reception she had planned for him—brief, matter-of-fact and bristling with satire—required a certain modification.
"I wasn't looking for a social call," Edith said guardedly after a non-committal greeting. "I thought perhaps you had some business matter to discuss."
"Still unforgiving!" Cosden smiled. "What can I do to make you forgetful?"
"Of what?" Edith asked with well-feigned surprise.
"Then suppose we assume that you have forgotten."
"Aren't you over here on business?"
"Yes; and pleasure, too. This is the pleasure."
Her mystification was genuine. Was this the self-assertive, vivified piece of machinery she had known three months before? Cosden could but see her surprise and it pleased him.
"I told you I should find out what was the matter with me. Have I partially succeeded?"
"Yes," she acknowledged frankly; "what did it?"
"Huntington and—you."
"But you couldn't change like this in so short a time; no one could."
"Most of it is probably on the surface," he admitted cheerfully. "Underneath is the same Cosden branded with the ear-marks of his business. But I'm on my way, and if there's enough of a change to have you notice it, then there's hope!"
"Have you seen the Thatchers?" Edith asked, not knowing just how to answer him.
"I saw Mr. Thatcher yesterday. He asked me to dine with them to-night, but I thought I'd wait until next time I'm over. He says Mrs. Thatcher is planning to have our whole Bermuda party down at the shore in July. You will be there, of course?"
"If it's in July, I shall be. Marian has invited me to spend the month with her."
"Good! that was one of the things I called to find out."
"What are the others?"
"Whether you are forgiving and—forgetful."
Edith laughed at the serious way he asked the question.
"Are you laughing at me or with me?" he demanded half in earnest.
"Why, I don't know what to make of you."
"Make whatever you like,—it's in your hands!"
"But I feel we ought to become acquainted all over again.
"So do I; that is another one of the things I wanted to find out.—Will you dine with me to-night, and then go to the theater afterwards?"
"Why—" she hesitated.
"It's the best possible way to get acquainted over again," he insisted.
"I'm not sure that I want to," Edith retorted; "but I will admit that you've excited my curiosity."
"That's something," Cosden replied good-naturedly. "Why isn't an evening together the easiest way to satisfy it?"
"All right," Edith said with sudden decision. "I really must know more about this."
"The veneer may wear off before the evening is over."
"That's what I'm thinking," she answered frankly. "I'm wondering how deep it really goes."
Easter came to New York, as it did to other places, and with it came Billy Huntington and Philip to the Thatchers. "Always have something to radiate from," some one once advised, "if only a fly-speck." To Billy, Boston was the fly-speck, entirely satisfactory as a point of radiation but far too respectable, much too decorous, and altogether too near home to be associated with his idea of a good time. Billy's life had been running so long on high gear that the lower speeds had almost been forgotten. This was typical of the times rather than a suggestion that the boy himself exceeded the speed limit. It was the limit which insisted upon exceeding itself, and he simply extended his pace to keep up with everything around him,—the limit of yesterday kept becoming the commonplace of to-day.
In New York Billy always found the limit just enough ahead of what it was in Boston to give him the additional thrill which added zest to his life. The very atmosphere seemed charged with a different ozone, filled with microbes impelling incessant activity. Everything not already in motion seemed straining at its leash, impatient to dash forward atthe earliest opportunity. No one ever seemed satisfied to where he was, but hurried onward to somewhere else or something different. It was the city of unrest but never of discontent, for the changing, kaleidoscopic conditions came as a result of a demand from those who had the price to pay. It fascinated Billy, as it fascinates its tens of thousands, and as he leaned back in the Thatchers' limousine, held up by the lines of traffic on Fifth Avenue, then dashing forward to make up for lost time between the intersecting streets, he turned his beaming face toward his friend and murmured contentedly, "This is the life!"
"The ride home gets worse every time I take it," was Philip's comment. "If things keep on they will have to make the Avenue a double-decker street."
"By that time New-Yorkers will ride home in their aeroplanes," Billy replied. "You can't hold them down by a little thing like congestion."
Billy loved it, and for him the car turned off the Avenue all too soon, in its final dash for the East Side. He wanted more time between his arrival at the Grand Central Station and his appearance at the Thatcher mansion to shake off what he felt to be his Boston provincialism, and to feel outwardly as well as inwardly the real New-Yorker which he craved to be.
"What are we doing to-night?" Billy asked as they drew near their destination.
"I wrote Dad to get tickets for some show. You said you wanted to see everything in town."
"Great! Merry will go, won't she?"
"I don't know. I can manage Mother and Dad all right, but when it comes to Merry, that's different."
"But she knows I'm coming—" Billy showed signs of feeling aggrieved.
"Oh, she'll probably go all right. Why fuss until we find out? But I don't think she's as crazy about you as you are about her."
"Girls always conceal their real feelings," Billy explained sagely.
"Perhaps," Philip conceded very little; "but Merry isn't like most girls. Sometimes she seems about my own age and sometimes old enough to be my mother. But have it your own way; I should worry."
The welcome was hearty enough to satisfy even Billy, so the pessimism of his friend was at once forgotten. Mrs. Thatcher opened her arms wide to both boys, while Merry, though less demonstrative, was equally cordial in her reception.
"I'm awfully glad to see you," Billy said with a sincerity which could not be doubted, and grinning all over. "It seems ages since Mr. Cosden and Uncle Monty pushed me off the pier down at Bermuda."
Merry laughed. "That was a splendid idea of yours, Billy, to miss the steamer, but I was afraid you couldn't work it."
"S-ssh," Billy placed a finger on his lips. "Don't ever breathe that where Uncle Monty could hear you! I've made him believe it was a real accident."
"We're dining at seven, boys," Mrs. Thatcherinterrupted; "that will give us comfortable time to reach the theater."
"Are we all going?" Phil asked.
"All but your father; he's feeling too tired to-night."
"Dad's well, isn't he?" Philip demanded quickly.
"Yes,—but tired," his mother answered. "He's all right. Now run along and dress or you'll be late for dinner."
On his way up-stairs Philip stopped in his father's room. "Hello, Dad!" he cried, pushing the door open unceremoniously. "Why, Dad,—you're not well! Mother said you were only tired."
Thatcher was sitting in front of the great, old-fashioned desk which Philip had associated with business and mystery since his childhood days, and when the door was unexpectedly thrown open it disclosed him resting his head upon his hands. The papers which Philip usually saw spread out on the desk were lacking, so the position his father had taken was the result of habit rather than present necessity. It was the expression on the elder man's face which forced the exclamation.
Thatcher rose quickly and stepped forward to greet his son. "Nonsense, boy! I'm all right," he exclaimed with an effort to speak lightly which did not escape Philip; "I'm just tired, as your mother said.—I didn't hear you come in or I would have been down-stairs to meet you."
"You're not all right," Philip protested stoutly, still holding his father's hand and looking squarely into his face. "You don't need to do this with me, Dad; I'm a man now, and we ought to talk togetherlike men.—Has this anything to do with what you wrote me about my allowance?"
"We'll discuss it in the morning, Phil," Thatcher evaded. "Get dressed now, and later we'll talk things over like two men, as you say. It will help me to do that. Don't worry, boy; everything will come out all right."
"That's a promise, Dad?"
"Yes; we'll put our heads together in the morning."
Thatcher was as gay as the young people when they sat down to dinner, and entered into the enjoyment of the home-coming so heartily that Marian was relieved.
"All you needed, Harry, was to have Phil come home," she said. "Couldn't you telephone for another ticket and go with us?"
"Not to-night; I have work to do. To-morrow Phil is going to lend a hand, and then perhaps we'll have some play together.—Tell us of your uncle, Billy."
"Oh, Uncle Monty is all right,—except that he's become so terribly sober and serious. What did you people do to him down at Bermuda? He hasn't been the same since."
"He was serious down there," Merry asserted.
"Oh, he never was a cut-up, of course," Billy explained; "but he was always saying things to make you laugh, and I could jolly him just as if he was one of the fellows."
"Can't you do it now?" Mrs. Thatcher inquired.
"No; if I do he gets sore. Why, only the other night Phil and I went in there to dinner. I madesome remark about his being a woman-hater, and he got huffed up in a minute. Didn't he, Phil?"
"Monty Huntington a woman-hater?" Mrs. Thatcher laughed. "No wonder he was 'huffed'!"
"But he never married, did he? Isn't that a sure sign that he's a woman-hater?"
"Oh, dear no!" Mrs. Thatcher insisted. "That may be taken quite as much as an evidence of his profoundest respect and veneration for woman. In fact, if fifty per cent. of the men who do marry would refrain from it no greater tribute could be paid us!"
The boy looked at her inquiringly. "Do all older people run marriage down like that?" he inquired. "Every time the subject comes up some one gives it a knock. With Uncle Monty, of course, it's sour grapes, because now he's so old no one would think of marrying him, but—"
"He's not so old," Merry interrupted unexpectedly and with such force that Billy was taken by surprise.
"Oh, ho!" Billy cried. "So that's the way the land lies! Now you've said a mouthful. This is a case of mutual admiration! Uncle Monty told us the other night that you were the finest girl he ever saw."
"He did!" Merry cried, the blood rushing into her cheeks and her face aglow with pleasure. "I wish I thought he really meant it!"
"He meant it all right," Philip corroborated. "Mr. Huntington doesn't make mouth-bets. He was calling me down for saying that you were just like other girls."
"Were you so ungallant as that?" Thatcherasked. "Whatever else happens, Phil, we must stand up for the family."
"Of course," he admitted; "but Billy was talking about Merry in superlatives as usual, and I was trying to quiet him down."
"Phil is doing his best to put me in wrong again," Billy protested. "Now I'll tell you just what happened and you can judge for yourselves: I was telling Uncle Monty how happy I was to be invited here for Easter, and how glad I should be to see you all—"
"You never said a word about any one but Merry," Philip interrupted.
Billy looked vindictively at his friend and then smiled sheepishly.
"I meant all of you, of course. Then Phil tried to jolly me about caring for girls and for Merry in particular—"
"Don't be foolish, Billy!" Merry exclaimed.
"My! but it's hard to tell a story here, but I'm going to do it if I burst a blood-vessel! Uncle Monty agreed with me, and then said that Merry was the finest girl he ever saw. That from him is some praise, because he never cuts in on girls at all; but you've made a hit with him, Merry, and you might as well know it."
"I'm glad he hasn't forgotten me," she said quietly, but the color remained in her face after the conversation turned upon other topics.
"What I said a moment ago isn't 'knocking,' as you call it, Billy," Mrs. Thatcher resumed; "it is experience. We older folk know from what we've seen, and from what we've been through, the dangersyoung people run during the inflammable age; so we sound the warning. You are at that age now, Billy, so your friends are trying to protect you. Philip apparently hasn't arrived there yet, but he will; and then we'll try to protect him from the idea that the 'only girl' is the one he happens to fancy while the period lasts."
"You're making me look like a flivver!" the boy said with mortification in his voice; "and before Merry, too!"
"No, my dear; you mustn't take it that way. I'm talking no more freely than you have been. We consider you one of the family, so I'm speaking to you just as I would to Philip."
Billy's face was fiery red, but he never flinched in his dogged determination.
"I don't care who knows how much I think of Merry," he said defiantly. "You've spoiled my visit! I'm not a bit ashamed—"
"Forgive me, Billy," she soothed him gently,—"of course you're not ashamed. I wouldn't speak to you like this if you weren't one of my own boys; but I do want you to realize that it is seldom that early fancies are more than impersonal idealizations. I'm glad you and Merry like each other, and I hope you will always be the best of friends; but, in applying our idealization to the one who at the moment comes nearest to the realization, a mistake is usually made because the one we are really looking for hasn't yet crossed our horizon."
"Sometimes, perhaps," Billy conceded; "but there are exceptions."
Mrs. Thatcher smiled at his persistency. Sheliked the boy, and had seized on this opportunity to spare him the greater disappointment which she felt sure would come.
"Yes," she answered kindly; "there are exceptions. I know of one in my own experience, but in this case it only made it more unfortunate. I knew a boy once who applied the idealization formed during the inflammable period to a girl who at that time thought she cared for him. Then her horizon broadened and she found and married the man she really loved; but the boy held on to his early ideal, becoming a recluse, embittered against the world and incapable of seeing that unless the ideal becomes a reality to both it can never safely amount to anything."
Thatcher looked at his wife questioningly, and Merry's eyes also fastened themselves upon her mother's face. Marian's voice as much as her words disclosed more than she intended. As she paused Philip, supposing the conversation to be concluded, mentioned the name which was in each one's mind except the boys'.
"By the way, Mother," he remarked, "Mr. Huntington wants me to meet a friend of his named Hamlen, who, he says, used to be a friend of yours."
"Yes," she said, looking up at him quickly,—"yes; I, too, wish you to meet Mr. Hamlen. He is in New York now. Perhaps you will see him before you return. I want you to know him well."
As Thatcher assisted them in getting off to the theater, he managed to draw Marian one side.
"Hamlen's name is Philip, isn't it?" he asked.
She nodded, wondering at the question.
"Was that why you gave our boy the same name—and was it Hamlen you referred to just now?"
"Yes, Harry."
He drew her gently to him and kissed her. "Poor chap!" he said. "If I had known that I would have made a greater effort to be friendly with him."
During these depressed months Thatcher was not the only man of affairs who saw the successes of his career threatened with disaster as a result of the unnecessary burdens imposed by inexperienced and impractical officials at Washington. Business groaned aloud as destructive control and regulation delayed and paralyzed commerce. Labor, hand in hand with its new ally Theory, stalked abroad through the land, demanding shorter hours and increased wages, receiving recognition as a privileged class from those in authority, exempt from respecting others' rights, which is necessary to create and preserve responsibility: substance when it struck at Capital, shadow when Capital in self-defense struck back. The corporations which formed the pulse of the country's life were so harassed that they paused in their constructive energies, wondering what new menace would rise up before them, and yet were expected to give better service while bound hand and foot by unwise legislative restrictions, and burdened by unnecessary legislative demands for increased expenditure. Samson, shorn of his strength by the shears of a legalized Delilah, was expected to hold up with his enervated armsthe pillars of the temple which "psychological" complacency was pulling down.
The first serious rumors reached Thatcher in Bermuda, and when he returned to his office his far-sighted perception told him that the business world was face to face with a real crisis. Many of his enterprises were in a condition where to pause in aggressive action meant going backwards, entailing loss upon all concerned; yet to proceed in the face of conditions as they were was to invite disaster and even to imperil the stability of his firm.
Cosden had felt the result of the depression in decreased business, but he did not realize as soon as Thatcher the far-reaching results inevitable from the new governmental policy. His horizon was local compared to that of the New York operator, and he regarded the conditions as a phase of business life, bound to appear once in so often, rather than a blow at the basis upon which the commercial world rested. He cut down his expenses in proportion to his reduced volume of business, strengthened his relations at his banks, and considered his sails trimmed to weather any storm.
Thatcher had invited him to call, and Cosden had no idea other than to make the most of the intimacy which had developed in Bermuda. More than that, the machinery matter they had touched upon had progressed even better than he expected. If Thatcher was still curious to learn more about the details the time had now come when he could safely be told. But to Cosden's surprise the subject was not once directly referred to during their interview. Thatcher was cordial and affable, seeminglyinterested in the general conversation and frank in his discussion of various topics which presented themselves, but, as it appeared to Cosden, strangely reticent upon certain specific subjects on which he would have been glad to draw him out. It was only when Cosden paused for a moment at the door of the private office that Thatcher made any remark which gave his visitor an insight as to what was in his mind.
"The full meaning of these present conditions evidently has not struck Boston yet," he said. "Let me tell you that these are times when the wise man learns how to wait. Instead of blaming your customers who hesitate to give you the usual orders you should scrupulously investigate the credit of those who do."
"I can wait," Cosden said confidently. "I've always held myself back from spreading out too thin, and if there's a storm coming on top of this sloppy weather I'm fixed where I can meet it better perhaps than some others."
"You are to be congratulated," Thatcher told him with so much feeling that Cosden took it as a personal compliment and departed well satisfied with his interview.
When he next met Huntington in Boston they discussed this among other topics, and Cosden was surprised to have his friend ask him point-blank whether he had heard rumors regarding Thatcher's firm.
"You're dreaming, Monty," he replied with conviction. "Thatcher is a man who makes money whichever way the market turns. That's what Iadmire so much in him. I only win out when things go one way, but he wins coming and going. What in the world put that idea in your head?"
The chance remark which Billy had made regarding the reduction in Philip's allowance was too much in the nature of a confidence to be repeated, but it had left Huntington with a definite impression that Thatcher must be feeling the conditions acutely or he would not have begun to curtail expenses at home. To a man who lived as Thatcher did, Huntington knew that this would be the hardest duty he would find to perform. Cosden's question was answered lightly.
"Wall Street is being hit hard," he said. "I am hoping that so good a fellow as Thatcher won't be caught in the reaction."
"Don't worry about that," Cosden laughed. "You'll find when the sky clears that he has looked far enough ahead to make even the storm pay him tribute."
"Hamlen arrives to-morrow," Huntington remarked, changing the subject lest his question raise some doubts in Cosden's mind which might linger. "I shall give myself up to him a good deal while he is here, so you mustn't be surprised if you don't see as much of me as usual. He needs me more than you do."
"That may be," Cosden admitted, "but how about you? I have an idea that, with the peculiar state of mind you've been in lately, you will forget your overpowering sense of age better with me than you will with him."
"Perhaps," Huntington admitted, smiling; "but I must think of him first."
"You don't mind my butting in on you both once in a while?"
"On the contrary; but I know how little you have in common with Hamlen. I'm afraid he may bore you."
"You forget my reincarnation," Cosden said dryly. "Who knows but that I was a professor of classical antiquities in my previous existence? If he bores me I'll cut out; but I've an idea that he can teach me a thing or two, and just now I'm keen on becoming educated."
There was a marked restraint in Hamlen's manner when Huntington met him at the station and motored him to the Beacon Street house. His embarrassment and the all too obvious efforts he made to impress upon his friend the occasion of his leaving Bermuda would have convinced Huntington, if he had not already known, that the real reason was that which he had already anticipated in his prediction to Mrs. Thatcher. Yet no one but Hamlen knew the agony of loneliness he had experienced when, after watching the steamer disappear, he returned to his empty villa. No one but Hamlen knew of the struggle he had passed through in his efforts to readjust his life, or of the terror which came to him with the final realization that he could no longer find solace in the work which he had previously forced to absorb his waking hours.
It was this terror Huntington saw in his classmate's eyes which told him all that any one would ever know of the real tragedy. Hamlen looked years older,—his face was more sallow, his hair more grey. Huntington looked at him in pity, andfelt apprehensive lest the task he had allotted to himself had been too long postponed. Then the thought came back to him, "He considers himself a failure and me a success!"
The welcome was such as to reassure Hamlen as much as anything could. Huntington made him feel as much at home as was possible for one whose mental poise was so sadly disordered. No special effort was made at conversation; everything was treated as a matter of course. Little by little Hamlen found himself, and as he spoke more freely Huntington entered into his spirit, but followed rather than led.
"It is a relief to get into this quieter atmosphere after New York," Hamlen remarked after they had sat in silence for some moments at the table after dinner. "I felt as if I had been suddenly put down in a whirling maelstrom, and there wasn't a minute when I did not expect to be annihilated the next!"
Huntington laughed quietly. "A New-Yorker would consider that the most subtle compliment you could pay his city. It is not enough to have the stranger merely impressed; he must be appalled!"
Hamlen raised his hands in a silent gesture.
"Have you arranged your business matters to your satisfaction?" Huntington asked, rather by way of conversation than from curiosity.
"Yes," Hamlen answered, but with a mental reservation which his friend noticed,—"yes; and yet even that wasn't as I expected."
He paused a moment, gazing into the fire which Huntington had ordered lighted to take off the chill which the late Spring still left in the air.
"I am puzzled about it," Hamlen continued. "You see, most of my investments have been in England, and it seemed to me that it would be wise to take advantage of an opportunity I had to realize on them, and to reinvest here in the States while everything is so much below its real value. Knowing Mr. Thatcher as I did I naturally went straight to him about it. He was most kind in advising me to hold off a while longer, as securities are likely to fall still further; but when I asked him to accept my money on deposit he declined, and offered instead to give me a letter of introduction to a bank."
"Why, Thatcher's house does a large banking business."
"That is what puzzles me; why should he decline my account?"
"I don't believe he meant just that," Huntington explained; "he probably wanted you to understand that he was not looking for business from his friends."
"No, he flatly refused to accept it; for I tried to insist upon it. I know few people here now, and I didn't feel like entrusting so considerable a sum to any institution, however well recommended, without personal acquaintance with some of its officers."
"I don't understand it."
"Nor I. Of course, I had no alternative, so I deposited it in the bank Thatcher suggested."
"Did you see much of the family while you were in New York?" Huntington queried.
Hamlen looked up quickly, with a return of the apprehensive expression his face had worn earlier.
"I saw them several times," he said. Then, after a moment's hesitation, he added: "Later, you must let me impose still further upon your friendship. I have no one else to counsel me."
Hamlen's voice was apologetic.
"I sha'n't consider that you accept my friendship at its par value unless you call upon me in any way I can be of service to you."
"Then perhaps you won't mind if I speak now," Hamlen responded eagerly. "It really has been preying upon me until I am unfitted for anything else. It would be a relief to share it."
After saying this Hamlen found it more difficult to continue. "You probably don't know," he said at length, "that Mrs. Thatcher and I knew each other intimately years ago."
"Yes," Huntington acknowledged frankly; "Mrs. Thatcher told me, while we were in Bermuda."
Hamlen was relieved. "It was a very close intimacy," he continued. "I feel that perhaps I ought to be guided by her judgment now, yet I find it difficult to accept for many reasons. In short, she thinks that I should marry."
During the last few moments Huntington had anticipated this announcement, but he refrained from making comment. Hamlen looked over at him for a word of encouragement, but as none came he went on.
"I know myself to be entirely unfitted, and it is the last thing in the world I should have thought of; but lately I have mistrusted my own judgment, which leaves me absolutely without a guide of any kind. So when any one I respect as I do Mrs.Thatcher makes such a statement, and even suggests the possibility of my marrying her own daughter, I don't know what to do. I can't believe that the girl would consider me as a husband, yet Marian is confident that if it could be arranged it would be for the happiness of all concerned."
"Are you fond of Merry?" Huntington demanded.
"As Marian's daughter, yes. I admire her tremendously, for in some ways she reminds me of her mother. But what in the world have I to offer her?"
"What has any man to offer the woman he marries," Huntington replied with feeling, "in comparison to what she brings into his life? He stakes nothing but his liberty; she stakes her future as well as her present."
"I know; but what do you advise me to do?"
"Has it occurred to you that Mrs. Thatcher is assuming a great responsibility in pledging her daughter's consent?"
"Yes; I am afraid her influence over the girl is as strong as it is over me. She is a very magnetic woman."
"Do you mean that you question your own strength?"
"That is exactly what I mean," he answered, dropping his eyes.
"My promise of assistance was an empty one, after all," Huntington said with more bitterness than had ever before crept into his voice. "The alchemy of a woman's heart is past the comprehension of a bachelor like myself. But why settle your problem so hastily? You are here with me now, and what Iintend to show you of life will fit you better than anything else to answer that question for yourself. Don't let it overwhelm you. See how far you can enter into what goes on about you, and then draw your conclusions regarding the probabilities of the future."
"Are marriages ever successful when one's heart is made up of burnt ashes?"
"Don't ask me that, my friend!" Huntington begged. "You and I have reached an age where we are entitled to use logic and judgment, and to live the years which remain to us as those two attributes may dictate. For the next few weeks I want you to imagine that you are back in college again, with no responsibilities heavier than that of enjoying yourself better than before because your sense of proportion has been developed by experience. When these weeks are past, we may again consider whether our hearts are made up of burnt ashes or of rich Harvard crimson blood. Until then, my friend, let us steadfastly refuse to be stampeded, and claim the benefit of every doubt."
Philip Thatcher responded to the suggestion made by Huntington and his mother with such conspicuous success that within a fortnight Hamlen accepted his leadership from one experience to another with wonderment and devotion. The fact that the boy was his namesake formed the first bond, and with confidence once established intimacy developed rapidly. Boys to Hamlen had been unknown quantities, creatures to be endured if necessary but avoided if possible, and Philip did much to raise the standard of his genus in the older man's mind. Billy's explosive outbursts startled him for a time, but he learned to understand even these, and accepted them at their true value.
The responsibility came to young Thatcher at just the time when he was best prepared to accept it. During the Easter recess his father suddenly discovered that the boy had become a man, and it was with real gratification that he took him into his confidence. To Philip, the statement of present conditions made impending disaster seem conclusive, and it was with difficulty that Thatcher persuaded him that many things might happen to ease thesituation before calamity really overtook him. The boy wanted to leave college at once, and to throw himself into some sphere of business activity so that his income might be added to the family exchequer to keep the wolf from the door! His father, strengthened by the youthful loyalty and enthusiasm, pointed out the value, as a personal asset to himself, of actually possessing a college degree, now so nearly secured, and sent the boy back to Cambridge with a determination to make the most of the few remaining months in preparing himself to rush into the breach and save his family from the threatening malignant specters.
The whole experience was a sobering one to Philip, and resulted in putting him nearer on a plane with Hamlen. To the one, the world had already proved its unreliability; to the other, it was now on trial with every presumption of speedy conviction. Each event in the day took on a new significance in the boy's mind, and Hamlen's dependence made him feel that he was already man-grown, taking his place in the front rank of the battle of life.
Huntington watched these developments with a curious sensation of interest and surprise. The most he had hoped was that Philip might take the man far enough into undergraduate activities to give him by assimilation a fresh viewpoint, but he found his guest largely taken off his hands by one who was accomplishing the desired results far better than he himself could do. Day by day he saw Philip winning a deeper hold upon the affections of his older friend, and he marveled at the changes taking place in Hamlen. For himself, he quietlyforced him to meet such of their classmates as were in Boston, preparing them by a brief outline of Hamlen's experiences to extend a fitting welcome; but he left it to Philip to show him what the new Harvard really is.
It was impossible to have all this happen without misgivings and questioning on the part of his guest.
"I appreciate all this," Hamlen said to him one evening; "but don't for a minute think that I take credit for the sudden interest on the part of the fellows who never noticed me when I was in college. That belongs to you. With the position you had then, and which you hold in the Class to-day, the boys would drink healths and sing, 'For he's a jolly good fellow' to a Fiji islander if he happened to be your friend."
"Suppose we grant all that," Huntington answered frankly; "what difference does it make? Didn't you tell me that you owned a piece of land in Oklahoma on which oil was struck?"
"Yes," Hamlen replied; surprised that his friend should so abruptly turn the conversation. "What has that to do with our discussion?"
"How much did you value it before you discovered what it contained?"
"It was a joke; I begrudged even paying the taxes."
"Now you consider it well worth including among your investments?"
"Naturally. It is one of the best things I own."
Huntington smiled at him quietly. "Don't you see the application? It is no reflection on those who walked over that land that they were ignorant ofthe riches which lay beneath their feet. It is no reflection on the sincerity of your classmates that they like you now and did not know you before. I discovered what you really are, Hamlen, quite as accidentally as you struck oil in that apparently worthless land in Oklahoma. Now I stand simply as the promoter of a property which has proved its worth."
When Hamlen unpacked his trunk at Huntington's house he produced a volume of Milton's "Areopagitica" which he placed in his friend's hand.
"This is the latest issue from the 'Island Press,'" he said. "It was nearly completed before you all came down to Bermuda and disturbed my peace of mind. I put the covers on after you left, but I haven't been able to produce a thing since. I believe this is the last book I shall ever make."
Huntington turned the leaves with great interest. "Exquisite!" he exclaimed. "Quite the best example you have turned out. I love that type of yours, Hamlen, for I feel it is the exemplification of William Morris' definition of the Type Ideal,—'pure in form, severe without needless excrescences, solid without the thickening and thinning of the line, and not compressed laterally.' You have carried out what he set himself to do and failed. How many copies did you print?"
"Only fifty."
"Splendid! But I am selfish enough to wish there was but one, and that I owned it! I never saw finer presswork in my life."
"You may gratify your wish if you like," Hamlenreplied indifferently. "I have the whole lot in my trunk up-stairs, and you may destroy the other forty-nine if you choose. They are yours to do with as you will."
"You don't mean it!" Huntington cried, enthusiastically.
He fondled the copy in his hand, and his face was lighted by the pleasure of the moment. Then he laughed.
"It is a frightful temptation, Hamlen! Think of owning the only copy in existence of a book like that! Bibliomania leads one on almost to crime, and it would be nothing less to prevent other collectors from enjoying this wonderful volume. I accept the gift proudly, Hamlen; I will make good use of it."
At the next monthly gathering of his fellow-collectors in their attractive club-house Huntington took Hamlen with him as his guest. He introduced him to his friends, but made no reference to the fact that he was the creator of the productions of the Island Press. They listened to an interesting paper, and then seated themselves at the long supper-table to prove that even bibliomaniacs are human. Here Huntington adroitly turned the conversation upon the subject of Hamlen's work.
Huntington had told his friend that when once he heard the opinions of other collectors the words of praise spoken at Bermuda would seem mild; and the prediction proved true. Hamlen's cheeks burned as he heard his work extolled and himself compared to the master-printers of the past. There could be no doubt of the sincerity of the comment,for no one but Huntington knew his identity; and the pleasure he felt was so intense that it almost overcame him.
As the discussion waned Huntington made his dramatic play. Each member present was handed a copy of the "Areopagitica," on the fly-leaf of which Hamlen had written his autograph.
"A gift from our guest," Huntington explained; "and each copy is inscribed by the master-printer of the Island Press."
The silence which followed heightened the effect of Huntington'scoup, and Hamlen felt the blood rushing to his face. Huntington watched the proceedings with evident relish, and as comprehension followed surprise in the minds of his fellow-members he held his glass aloft.
"To the health, gentlemen, of Philip Hamlen, our master-printer, an American, thank God, who knows how to preserve that art preservative of all arts!"
It was the first triumph Hamlen had ever tasted, and as Huntington watched his face he feared that in the desire to give him the confidence of approval he had over-estimated his friend's physical strength. But joy never kills, and the first weakness was conquered by the necessity of living up to the position which had been thrust upon him. He responded bravely, and Huntington smiled contentedly as he saw still another barrier broken down between Philip Hamlen and the world he believed to be against him. On their way home no word was spoken in the motor-car, but when safe within the retreat of the library, which Hamlen had learned to love, the pent-up emotion burst forth.
"Then I have done something after all!" he cried. "My life has not been all a mistake! Heaven knows what a mess I've made of it, but at least there is something saved out of the wreck? You think they meant it, don't you, Huntington?" he asked beseechingly, and he found his answer in the beaming countenance of his friend. "I had no idea it would mean so much, that so wonderful an experience as I had to-night could ever come to me. Even now I can't understand it. Those little books are only expressions of myself; I made them merely for personal gratification."
"In doing so, my friend, you gave yourself to us; and more than that no man can do!"
The wonderful weeks went by, filled with a bewildering series of unusual experiences for Hamlen and of continuing satisfaction to Huntington. Philip unfolded to him day by day the various elements which went to make the new Harvard spirit, and Huntington supplemented the boy's efforts by keeping his guest in touch with the graduate activities centered in and reaching their climax in the building of the "Home of the Harvard Club" in Boston, dedicated as "the tomb of Harvard indifference." Hamlen saw the freshmen segregated in their own dormitories, and forced to become acquainted one with another, and he realized what it would have meant to him at a similar time in his life if heads wiser than his own had compelled him to show himself to his classmates. He stood within the massive Stadium, he went to a mass-meeting at the Harvard Union, he followed the crew on the Charles in the launch "John Harvard," proud thatPhilip, his namesake, had won a place in the boat. He spent many hours at the Harvard Club with Huntington, watching the democracy which means unity, and the unity which means fellowship. For the first time he felt a pride to be a part of it, for the first time his degree stood to him as something more than what he learned from books. Philip was to row against Yale, and he felt that he himself, at last, was to take part in an intercollegiate contest, once the ambition of his life. He was no longer a man without a college, but was one of that great brotherhood which recognizes its heritage, and stands ready to live up to the responsibilities this heritage entails.