"YOU MUST LET ME PAY YOU FOR IT.""YOU MUST LET ME PAY YOU FOR IT."
"YOU MUST LET ME PAY YOU FOR IT.""YOU MUST LET ME PAY YOU FOR IT."
"It's not worth anything," objected Jud.
"I know what it is worth. Fifty dollars is cheap."
Before she had finished speaking she was counting the money from her purse. Thrusting five bills into Jud's hand, she snatched up the picture and said:
"It's a bargain, isn't it? You can't take back the picture because you have accepted payment."
"Good heaven!—I mean, I can't take all of this!"
"But you can and shall," she cried delightedly. "It is not enough, I'm sure, but it is all I have with me. Some day, when you are famous, I shall have a valuable picture. Now I must be going. My mother and brother are probably in convulsions. See them? Don't they look angry? Our train had to wait three hours over at the other side of the woods until they could repair the engine. We had a breakdown."
"I wish you wouldn't force me to——" Jud began.
"Don't object, now!" she cried. "I am the gainer. Save that money to give to your sweetheart on your wedding day. That's a very pretty idea, isn't it? I know she will approve." And here she came to Justine and kissed her. "I know I should like you very much," she said honestly. Justine felt a queer sensation in her throat and her heart went out more than ever to the girl in gray.
"Remember, it is to be your wedding present when the sweet day comes."
Jud and Justine glanced sheepishly at one another, but before either had found words to tell her they were already married, she was hastening away.
"Oh, by the way," she cried, turning back, "what is your name?"
"Dudley Sherrod."
"It would be well for me to know it when you are famous. Good-bye!" she called cheerfully.
Jud hesitated an instant.
"Won't you tell me your name?" he cried. Justine clasped his arm in mute astonishment.
The receding girl turned, smiled, and held up her card, hastily withdrawn from its case. It fluttered to the grass, and she was gone.
Jud hurried down the slope and snatched up the piece of cardboard. His eyes sought the name, then the departing enchantress. His heart was full of thankfulness to the stranger, whose gray figure was disappearing among the oaks.
"She seems just like the fairy queen in the stories we used to read, Jud," said Justine. Looking over his shoulders, she read aloud: "'Miss Wood.' Oh, dear; it doesn't give her first name. How I wish I knew it!"
"And it don't say where she lives," said Jud slowly.
"Chicago, I'm sure. Don't you remember what she said about wishing she had you there? Dear me, what could she do with a country boy like you in that great place? Harve Crose says there are more people there than there are in this whole county. But wasn't she nice, Jud, wasn't she nice? And did you ever see such a beautiful face?" Here Jud's sober, thoughtful eyes looked so intently upon his wife's brilliant face that she blushed under the unspoken compliment. "And her clothes, Jud! Weren't they grand? Oh, oh, I never saw any one like her!"
The two walked slowly homeward, excitedly discussing the fair stranger and her generosity. All the evening she and the fifty dollars so unexpectedly acquired were the topics of conversation. Jud insisted upon buying a new dress for Justine—as a "wedding present"—but she demurred. The money was to go into the bank the next day, she insisted; and she ruled.
He was lying beneath a big tree in the yard, looking up at the stars, reflectively drawing a long spear of wire grass through his teeth. She sat beside him, her back against the tree, serene, proud, and happy. It was he who broke the long silence, dreamily.
"I wonder if I could make it go in Chicago."
She started from her reverie and her hand fell upon his arm. For an instant her big eyes narrowed as if trying to penetrate some shadow. In another moment they opened wide again, and she was earnestly seeking to convince him that he could succeed in the great city.
The months sped by and side by side they toiled, she with love and devotion in her soul, he with ambition added. As the winter came he slaved with his pencil and pen, his heart bound to the new hope. The prediction at Proctor's Falls had inspired him; the glowing blue eyes had not lied to him even though the lips might have flattered. She had praised his work, and she knew! She must have known what he could do!
Justine shared the enthusiasm that had been awakened by Miss Wood. She looked upon that young woman as a goddess who had transformed her husband into a genius whose gifts were to make the world fall down in worship.
As the spring drew near Jud began to speak more often of the city and his chances for success there. He could see the pride and devotion in his wife's eyes, but he could also see a certain dim, wistful shadow in the depths. He knew she was grieving over the fear that some day he would desert their happy, simple home and rush out into the world, leaving her behind until he had won a place for her. She knew that he could not take her with him at the outset. He was to try his fortune in the strange, big city, and she was to stay in the little cottage and pray for the day to come speedily that would take her to him.
With him, ambition was tempered by love for her and the certainty that he could not leave her even to win fame and fortune. When he allowed himself to think of her alone in the cottage, looking sadly at the stars and thinking of him in the rushing city, he said to himself: "I can't leave her!" Both knew, although neither spoke it aloud, that if he went, he would have to go alone.
Justine understood his hesitation and its cause. She knew that she was holding him back, that she alone kept him from making the plunge into the world, and her heart was sore. Night after night she lay awake in his arms, her poor heart throbbing against his ambitious heart, writhing beneath the certain knowledge that she was the weight about his neck.
One day, late in the fall, when the strain upon her heart had become too great, she broke the fetters. It was at dusk, and, coming around the corner of the cottage, she found him sitting on the doorstep, his gaze far away, his dejection showing in the droop of the broad shoulders. A little gasp of pain came from her lips—pain mingled with love and pity for him. She stood for a moment, reading his thoughts as if they were printed before her eyes—thoughts of fame, honor, success, trial, chance! How good, how handsome, how noble he was! She was the weight, the drag! The hour had come for her to decide. He would never say the word—that much she knew.
"Jud," she said, standing bravely before him. He looked up, shaking off his dream. "Don't you think it about time you were trying your luck in Chicago? You surely have worked hard enough at your drawing, and I don't see why you put it off any longer."
For a moment he was unable to speak. Into his eyes came a blur of tears.
"But, Justine, dear, how are we to live there? They say it takes a fortune," he said. There was a breath of eagerness in his voice and she detected it.
She sat beside him and laid her arm about his shoulder. He turned his face to hers, wondering, and their eyes met. For a long time neither spoke by tongue, but they understood. A sob came into his throat as he lifted her hand from her lap and drew her to him almost convulsively.
"Justine, I can't do that! I can't go away off there and leave you here alone. Why, sweetheart, I'd die without you," he cried.
"But when you are able, dear, to take me to you in the great city, we can be the happiest people in the world," she said huskily. "I'll be lonesome and you'll be lonesome, but it won't be for long. You will succeed. I know it, dear, and you must not waste another day in this wilderness——"
"It is the sweetest place in the world," he cried, passionately. "Wilderness? With you here beside me? Oh, Justine, it will be wilderness if I go away from you!"
"Surely,surely, Jud, it is for the best. I know you can't take me now, but you can come after me some day, and then I'll know that I have lost nothing by letting you go. You will be a great—youwillsucceed! Why, Jud, you draw better than any one I ever knew about. Your pictures even now are better than any I have ever seen. They can't help liking you in Chicago. You must go—you must, Jud!" She was talking rapidly, excitedly.
"You love me so much that you are blind, dear. Up in Chicago they have thousands of artists who are better than I am, and they are starving. Wait a minute! Suppose I should fail! Suppose they should laugh at me and I couldn't get work. What then? I have no money, no friends up there. If I don't get on, what is to become of me? Did you ever think of that?"
"Haven't you me and the little farm to come back to, Jud? I'll be here and I'll love you more than ever. And I'll die here on this old place with you beside me, and never be sorry that you couldn't do for me everything you wish," she said solemnly. Then she went on quickly: "But you won't fail—you can't, Jud, you can't. Don't you remember what pretty Miss Wood said about your work? Well, didn't she know? Of course, she did. Shelivesin Chicago and she knows."
"If I knew where to find her or write to her, she might help me," said he, a new animation in his voice. "But there's no one I can write to. I don't know how to go about it."
"Go about it like other boys have done. Lots of them have gone out into the world and won their way. Now, Jud, when will you go?"
The moment of decision came too suddenly. He was not ready to meet it.
"I—I—oh, we can talk about this later on," he faltered.
"We must settle it now."
"Do you want me to go?" he asked after a moment.
"Yes, I do, Jud."
"How queer you are! I'd rather die than leave you, and yet you want me to go away from you," he said inconsistently.
"Don't say that! I love you better than my life! Don't you see that is why I want you to go? It is because I love you so, oh, so much, and I know it is for the best. It's not like losing you altogether. We'll be with each other soon, I know. You can come home to see me every once in awhile, don't you see? And then, when you feel that you can do so, you will take your poor little country girl into the great city to live with you. You'll be great, then; will you be ashamed of me?"
"Ashamed of you!" he cried.
For a long time he held her in his arms in the twilight, and pleaded with her to let him remain. To her courage, to the breaking of her heart, was due the step which started him out into the world to seek his fortune and hers.
The day was set for his departure. She drew from the bank the fifty dollars his first picture had brought, and pressed it into his reluctant hands. It was she who drove him into the village. In the pocket of his Sunday clothes he carried the names of newspaper artists, so familiar to him; they were the men he was to see—the strangers who were to be his Samaritans. If they lent him a helping hand all might go well.
She was to live without him in the little paradise, with old Mrs. Crane and Caleb Spangler's boy as companions. They were to conduct the affairs of the farm through the winter months, while he fought for a footing in another universe.
It was a sobbing girl who lay all that night in the broad bed, thinking of the boy whose curly head was missing from the pillow beside her, whose loving arms were gone, perhaps forever.
'Gene Crawley knew of Jud's intentions long before his departure. In fact, the whole township was aware of the great undertaking, and there was more or less gossip, and no end of doubt as to the wisdom of the step. It was generally conceded that Jud was a bright boy, but still "he wuzn't much to git ahead, even out in the country, so how in tarnation did he expect to make it go in the city?" A few of the evil-minded saw signs of waning love in the Sherrod cottage; others slyly winked and intimated that 'Gene Crawley had something to do with it; and the whole neighborhood solemnly shook hands with Jud and "hoped he'd come back richer'n Vanderbilt."
Crawley saw them drive away to the station in the village, and he saw the dejected young wife come slowly homeward at dusk. That night, while she rolled and sobbed in her bed, he sat on the fence across the lane from the dark cottage until long after midnight.
Jud's first night in Chicago was sleepless, even bedless. The train rolled into the Dearborn Street station at ten o'clock and he stumbled out into the smoky, clanging train-sheds among countless strangers. It was all different from the station platform at Glenville, or even the more pretentious depot in the town that had seen his short college career. Sharp rebuffs, amused smiles, and sarcastic rejoinders met his innocent queries as he wandered aimlessly about the station, carrying his ungainly "telescope." Dismayed and resentful, he refrained from asking questions at last, and for more than an hour sat upon one of the unfriendly benches near the gates. Once he plucked up enough courage to ask a stranger when he could get a train back to Glenville.
"Never heard of Glenville," was the unfeeling response.
The crowds did not interest the new arrival; he saw the people and novelties of a great city through dim, homesick eyes, and thought only of the old, familiar, well-beloved fences, lanes, and pastures, and Justine's sad face. His ambition waned. He realized that he did not belong in this great, unkind place; he saw that he was an object of curiosity and amusement; keenly he felt the inconsiderate stares of passers-by, and indeed he knew that his own strangeness was an excuse for the smiles which made him shrink with mortification. An old gentleman stopped at the news-stand hard by and selected a magazine. He stood beneath a dazzling arc light and turned the pages, glancing at the pictures. Jud was attracted by the honest kindliness of his face, and approached him. The old gentleman looked up.
"Excuse me, sir, but I am a stranger here, and I'd like to ask a favor," said Jud. He found that his voice was hoarse.
"I have nothing for you," said the old gentleman, returning to the magazine.
"I'm not a beggar," cried Jud, drawing back, cut to the quick.
"Don't you want enough to get a bed or something for a starving mother to eat?" sarcastically demanded the old gentleman, taking another look at the youth.
"I have had nothing but hard words since I came into this depot, and God knows I've tried to be respectful. What am I that every one should treat me like a dog? Do I look like a beggar or a thief? I know I look just what I am, a country boy, but that oughtn't to turn people against me." Jud uttered these words in a voice trembling with pent-up anger and the tears of a long-tried indignation. Suddenly his eyes flashed and he blurted forth the real fierceness of his feelings in a savage, and, for him, unusual display of resentment: "For two cents I'd tell the whole crowd to go to hell!"
It was this intense and startling expression that convinced the stranger of Jud's genuineness. There was no mistaking the sincerity of that wrath.
"My boy, you shouldn't say that. This is a big and busy city, and you must get used to the ways of it. I see you are a good, honest lad, and I beg pardon for my unkind words. Now, tell me, what can I do for you? My train leaves in ten minutes, so we have no time to spare. Tell me what you are doing here."
Jud's heart leaped at the sound of these, the first kindly tones he had heard, and he poured forth the disjointed story of his ambitions, not once thinking that the stranger could have no personal interest in them. But he had won an attentive listener.
"You're the sort of a boy I like," exclaimed the gray-haired Chicagoan, grasping the boy's hand. "I'll be back in Chicago in three or four days, and I'll do all I can to help you. Get along here as best you can till next Friday, and then come to see me. Here is my card," and he handed forth an engraved piece of cardboard. "Don't forget it, now, for I am interested in you. Hanged if I don't like a boy who talks as you did awhile ago. I feel that way myself sometimes. Good-bye; I must get this train. Friday morning, Mr.—Oh, what is your name?"
"Dudley Sherrod, sir, and I'm much obliged to you. But I wanted to ask a favor of you. Where can I find a place to sleep?"
"Good Lord, was that all you wanted?" And then the old gentleman directed him to a nearby hotel. "Stay there to-night, and if it's too high-priced, hunt a cheaper place to-morrow. There goes my train!"
Jud looked after him as he raced down the yard, and drew a breath of relief as he swung upon the rear platform of the last sleeper, awkwardly, but safely. Then he read the card. "Christopher Barlow," it said, "Investment Broker." It seemed promising, and with a somewhat lighter heart he made his way to his cumbersome valise, so unlike the neat boxes carried by other travelers, and prepared for the walk out into the lamplights of a Chicago street. He found the hotel, but had to occupy a chair in the office all night, for the rooms were full. A kind-hearted clerk gave him permission to remain there until morning, observing his fatigue and his loneliness. He even checked the boy's valise for him and told him where he could "wash up."
It was Tuesday morning when he started forth for his first walk about the streets of Chicago. The clerk recommended a cheap lodging-house and he found it without much difficulty, and began to feel more at home. Some one told him how to reach theRecordoffice, and he was soon asking a youth in the counting-room where he could find a certain artist. Here he encountered a peculiar rebuff. He was told that the artists did not go to work until nearly noon. To Jud, who had always gone to work at four in the morning, this was almost incomprehensible. In his ignorance, he at once began to see the easy life he might lead if ever he could obtain such a position.
All the morning he wandered about State and Clark Streets, Wabash Avenue, and the Lake Front. Everything was new and marvelous. From the lowly cot in the lane to the fifteen-story monsters in Chicago; from the meadows and cornfields to the miles of bewildering thoroughfares; from the occasional vehicle or passing farmhand of the "pike" to the thousands of rushing men and women on the congested sidewalks; from the hayracks and the side-boarded grain-wagon to the clanging street cars and the "L" trains; from the homely garb of the yokel to the fashionable clothes of the swell. It is a striking transition when it comes suddenly.
In the afternoon he was directed to the room of the newspaper artist. He carried with him his batch of drawings, and his heart was in his shoes. Already he had begun to learn something of the haste of city life. How could he hope to win more than the passing attention of the busy man? Several girls in the counting-room giggled as he strode by, and his ears flamed red. He did not know that more than one of those girls admired his straight, strong figure and sunburnt face.
The artist was drawing at his board when Jud entered the little room facing Fifth Avenue. There was no halo of glory hovering over the rumpled head, nor was there a sign of the glorious studio his dreams had pictured. He found himself standing in the doorway of what looked like a junk-shop. Desks were strewn with drawing-boards, cardboard, pens, pads, weights, thumb-tacks, unmounted photographs, and a heterogeneous assortment of things he had never seen before. The cartoonist barely glanced at him as he stepped inside the doorway.
"Morning," remarked the eminent man, and coolly resumed work on the drawing. Jud was stricken dumb by this indifference, expected as it was. He forgot the speech he had made up and stood hesitating, afraid to advance or retreat.
"Is this Mr. Brush?" he asked at length, after his disappointed eyes had swept the untidy den from floor to ceiling. Was this the room of a great artist? Shattered dream! The walls were covered with flaring posters, rough sketches, cheaply framed cartoons, and dozens of odd and ends, such as one sees in the junk-shops of art.
"Yes," was the brief response. "Have a chair. I'll talk to you in a minute." Jud sat in a chair near the door, his fingers spasmodically gripping the humble package of drawings he had brought all the way from the fields of Clay township to show to this surly genius whose work had been his inspiration.
"Fine day," said Mr. Brush, his head bent low over the board.
"Yes, sir," responded the visitor, who thought it one of the most dismal days in his life. After fully ten minutes of awkward silence, during which Jud found himself willing to hate the artist and that impolite pen, the artist straightened up in his chair and for the first time surveyed his caller.
"Do you want to see me about something?"
"I want to show you some of my drawings, if you have time to look at 'em—them, sir," said Jud timidly.
"Oh, you're another beginner who wants a job, eh?" said the other, a trifle sardonically. "Let's see 'em. I can tell you in advance, however, that you'll have a devil of a time finding an opening in Chicago. Papers all full and a hundred fellows looking for places. Live here? Oh, I see—from the country." This after a swift inspection of his visitor's general make-up. "I am a little busy just now. Can you come in at six o'clock?"
"Yes, sir. I'm sorry I bothered you," said Jud, glad, in his disillusionment, to find an excuse for leaving the crowded workshop. The artist, whimsical as are all men of his profession, suddenly fell to admiring the young man's face. It was a strong type, distinctly sketchable.
"Wait a minute. I have an engagement at six, come to think of it. I'll look at 'em now," he said, still gazing. Jud reluctantly placed the package on the table and proceeded, with nervous fingers, to untie the string which Justine had so lovingly, but so stubbornly, knotted. Every expression of the eager, embarrassed face impressed itself upon the keen eye of the watcher. It was with little or no interest, however, that Mr. Brush took up the little stock of drawings. This boy was but one of a hundred poor, aspiring fellows who had wearied him with their miserable efforts.
"Did you draw these?" he asked, after he had looked at three or four. Even Jud in all his embarrassment could see that his face had suddenly turned serious.
"Yes, sir, certainly," answered Jud.
"Didn't copy them?"
"No, sir. They are pictures of places and objects down in Glenville."
"Where is that?"
"In Indiana. You don't think they are copies, do you?"
"Drew 'em from life?" asked the other incredulously.
"Of course I did," said Jud with acerbity.
"Don't get mad, my boy. How long have you been drawing?"
"Since I was a boy—'knee high to a duck'—as we say down there."
"Ever have any instructions?"
"No, sir. I haven't been able to afford it. I want to go to an art school when I have raised the money."
The artist looked through the pack without another word and Jud fidgeted under the strain. He was anxious to have the critic condemn his work so that he could flee and have done with it.
"Here's a pad of paper and a pencil. See how long it will take you to sketch that elevated track and the building across the street. Sit up here near the window," commanded the artist.
Jud's nerve fled as he found himself called upon to draw beneath the eye of an expert, and it was only after some little urging that he was induced to attempt the sketch. He felt uncertain, incompetent, uncomfortable, mainly because he was to draw objects entirely new to his eyes. It was not like sketching the old barns and fences down in Clay township. Closing his jaws determinedly, however, he began the task, wondering why he was doing so in the face of a decision he had reached but a moment before. He had come to the conclusion that it was not worth while to try for a place in Chicago and had made up his mind to go back to the farm, defeated. In twenty minutes he had a good accurate outline of all that met his keen gaze beyond the window-sill, and was beginning to "fill in" when the artist checked him.
"That's enough. You can do it, I see. Now I believe that you drew all these from life and nature. What's your name?"
"Dudley Sherrod."
"Well, Mr. Sherrod, I don't know you, nor do I know where Glenville is, but I will say this much to you: a man who can draw such pictures as these is entitled to consideration anywhere. It kind o' paralyzes you, eh? You may rest assured that I am sincere, because we don't praise a man's work unless it is deserving. What are you doing up here? Looking for work?"
"I want to earn enough at something to give me a start, that's all. Do you really think I'll do, Mr. Brush?" His eyes were actually snapping with excitement.
"You can be made to do. It's in you. Try your hand at newspaper illustrating and then sail in for magazine work, etching, paintings—thunder, you can do it, if you have the nerve to stick to it!"
"But how am I to get work on a paper?"
"There are twenty-five applicants ahead of you here, and we are to lose a man next month—Mr. Kirby, who goes to New York. I'll see that you get his place. In the mean time, you'll have to wait until the first of the month, and, if you like, you may hang around the office and go out with the fellows on some of their assignments, just for practice. You won't get much of a salary to begin with, but you'll work up. I'm darn glad you came here first."
"How do you know I came here first?"
"Because you wouldn't have got away from another paper if you'd gone there. Have you any friends in the city?"
"No, sir—yes, I did meet a gentleman at the depot last night. I'm to call on him next Friday. Do you know him?" Sherrod gave him Christopher Barlow's card. The artist glanced at it, and, without a word, picked up a photograph from his desk.
"This the man?"
"Why, yes—isn't it funny you'd have it?"
"And here is his daughter." This time he displayed the picture of a beautiful girl. "And his wife, too." Jud held the three portraits in his hand, wondering how they came to be in the artist's possession. "Mrs. Barlow committed suicide this morning."
"Good heaven! You don't mean it. And has Mr. Barlow come home?"
"That's the trouble, my boy. You'll have a good deal to learn in Chicago, and you can't trust very much of anybody. You see, old man Barlow, who has been looked upon as the soul of honor, skipped town last night with a hundred thousand dollars belonging to depositors, and he is now where the detectives can't find him."
Jud was staggered. That kindly old gentleman a thief! The first man to give him a gentle word in the great city a fleeing criminal! He felt a cold perspiration start on his forehead. What manner of world was this?
His first day in Chicago ended with the long letter he wrote to Justine, an epistle teeming with enthusiasm and joy, brimming over with descriptions and experiences, not least of which was the story of Christopher Barlow.
Justine received his letter at the end of the week. The three days intervening between his departure and its arrival had seemed almost years. Since their marriage day they had not been separated for more than twelve consecutive hours. It was the first night she had spent alone—the night which followed his departure. In her brief, blissful married life it was the only night she had spent without his arm for a pillow.
The days were bleak and oppressive; she lived in a daze, almost to the point of unconsciousness. The nights brought dismal forebodings, cruel dreams, and sudden awakenings. She felt lost, in strange and unfriendly surroundings; where love, tenderness, and joy had been the reigning forces there was now only loneliness. No object seemed familiar to her. Everything that had given personality to the little farm was gone with the whistle of a locomotive, the clacking of railway coaches, the clanging of a bell. The landscape was not the same, the sky was no longer blue, the moon and stars were somber. Yank, the dog, moped about the place, purposeless, sad-eyed, and with no ambition in his erstwhile frisky tail. Jud had not been gone more than half a day when curious neighbors pulled up their horses at the gate.
"Heerd from Jud? How's he gittin' 'long in Chickawgo?"
"I haven't heard, Mr. Martin, but I am expecting a letter soon. How long does it take mail to get here from Chicago?"
"Depends a good deal on how fer it is."
"Oh, it's over two hundred miles, I know."
"Seems to me y'oughter be hearin' 'fore long, then. Shell I ast ef they's any mail fer you down to the post-office?"
"I have sent Charlie Spangler to the toll-gate, thank you."
"Gitep!"
Mail reached the cross-roads post-office twice a day, carried over by wagon from Glenville. Little Charlie Spangler was at the toll-gate morning and evening, at least half an hour before Mr. Hardesty drove up with the slim pouch, but it was not until the third morning that he was rewarded. Then came a thick envelope on which blazed the Chicago postmark. Every hanger-on about the toll-gate unhesitatingly declared the handwriting to be that of Jud Sherrod. It was addressed to Mrs. Dudley Sherrod. The letter was passed around for inspection before it was finally delivered to the proud boy, who ran nearly all the way to Justine's in his eagerness to learn as much as he could of its contents. Jim Hardesty had promised him a bunch of Yucatan if he brought all the news to the toll-gate before supper-time.
Justine knew the letter had come when she saw the spindle-shanked boy racing up the lane. She was awaiting the messenger at the gate.
"Is it from Jud?" she cried, hurrying to meet him, her face glowing once more. He was waving the epistle on high.
"That's what they all say," he panted, as he drew near. "Jim says he'd know Jud's writin' if he wrote in Chinese."
The poor, lonesome girl read the long letter as if it were the most thrilling novel, fascinated by every detail, enthralled by the wonderful experiences of her boy-husband in the great city. His descriptions of places, people, and customs, as they appeared to his untrained, marveling eye, were vivid, though disconnected. Then came the narration of his experience with the artist, supplemented by playful boasting, and the welcome news that he was to have employment on the great newspaper.
Justine had not, from the first, doubted his ability to find work in the city. While she glowed with pride and happiness, there was a little bitterness in her lonely heart. In that moment she realized that there had existed, unknown and unfelt, a hope that he would fail and that the failure would send him back to gladden the little home. Afterwards the bitterness gave way to rejoicing. Success to him meant success and happiness to both; his struggle was for her as well as for himself, and the end would justify the sacrifice of the beginning. It could not be for long—he had already clutched the standard of fame and she knew him to be a man who would bear it forward as long as there was life and health. She had supreme faith in his ambition—the only rival to his love.
She read certain parts of his letter aloud to Mrs. Crane and Charlie, glorying in their astonished ejaculations, widespread eyes, and excited "Ohs." Within herself she felt a certain wifely superiority, a little disdain for their surprise, a certain pity for their ignorance. With a touch of self-importance, innocently natural, she enjoyed the emotions of her companions, forgetting that she had just begun to break through the chrysalis of ignorance that still bound them.
Before "supper-time" Charlie Spangler was in possession of the Yucatan and Jim Hardesty's place was ringing with the news of Jud's success. Long before the night was over certain well-informed and calculating individuals were prophesying that inside of five years he would be running for the presidency of the United States.
"'Y gosh!" volunteered Mr. Hardesty, "thet boy's got it in him to be shuriff of this county, ef he'd a mind to run. 'F he stays up there in Chickawgo fer a year er two an' tends to his knittin' like a sensible feller'd oughter, he'll come back here with a reecord so derned hard to beat thet it wouldn't be a whipstitch tell he'd be the most pop'lar man in the hull county. Chickawgo puts a feller in the way of big things an' I bet three dollars Jed wouldn't have no trouble 't all gittin' the enomination fer shuriff."
"Shuriff, thunder! What'd he wanter run fer shuriff fer? Thet's no office fer a Chickawgo man. They run fer jedge or general or senator or somethin' highfalutin'. I heerd it said onct thet there has been more Presidents of the United States come from Chickawgo than from airy other State in the West. What Jed'll be doin' 'fore long will be to come out fer President or Vice-President, you mark my words, boys." Thus spake Uncle Sammy Godfrey, the sage of Clay township. He had been a voter for sixty years and his opinion on things political was next to law.
'Gene Crawley soon heard the news. He had been awaiting the letter with almost as much impatience as had Justine. If such a creature as he could pray, it had been his prayer that Justine's husband might find constant employment in Chicago. The torture of knowing that she was another man's wife could be assuaged if he were not compelled to see the happiness they found in being constantly together. He could have shouted for joy when he heard that Jud was to live in Chicago and that she was to remain on the farm, near him, for a time, at least.
"Well, Jed's gone, 'Gene," said Mrs. Hardesty, meaningly, as he leaned over the greasy counter that evening. "'Spose you don't keer much, do you?"
"Don't give a damn, one way or t'other," responded he, darkly, puffing away at his pipe. Despite his apparent calmness, his teeth were almost biting the cane pipe-stem in two. "Has he got a job?"
"He's goin' to draw picters fer a newspaper up there, an' they do say the pay's immense."
"How much is he to git?"
"He says in his letter he's to start out with $15 a week, an'll soon be gittin' twict as much."
"You mean amonth."
"No; a week, 'Gene. Thet's what the letter said."
"Aw, what you givin' us! Him to git $15 a week? Why, goldern it, I'm only gittin' $18 a month, an' I've allus been counted a better hand'n him. Who said that was in the letter?" Jealousy was getting the better of 'Gene.
"Charlie Spangler heerd Justine Van read it right out loud, an' he's a powerful quick-witted boy. He gen'rally hears things right."
"He's the cussedest little liar in Clay township," snarled 'Gene.
"You know better'n that, 'Gene Crawley. You're jest mad 'cause Jed's doin' well, thet's what you air, and you know it," cried she.
"Mad? What fer?" exclaimed he, trying to recover his temper for the first time in his life.
"'Cause you're jealous an' 'cause he's got her, thet's what fer," she said, conscious that she was stirring his violent nature to the boiling point. But to her surprise—and to his own, for that matter—he gulped and laughed coarsely.
"Well, he's welcome to her, ain't he?" he asked. "Who's got a better right?"
"Thet ain't the way you talked a year ago," she said meaningly.
"You know too dern much," he said and walked away, leaving behind a thoroughly dissatisfied woman. But Mrs. Hardesty did not know how deeply she had cut nor how he raged inwardly as he hurried homeward through the night.
Several days later he boldly climbed the meadow fence, and, for the first time since the fight, started across Justine's property on a short cut to the hills. What his object was in going to the hills in the dusk of that evening he himself did not clearly understand, but at the bottom of it all was the desire to intrude upon forbidden ground. Beneath the ugliness of his motive, however, there lurked a certain timidity. He was conscious that he was trespassing, and he knew she would not like it. But if she saw him cross the meadow, he never knew. His intention had been, of course, to attract her notice, and he was filled with disappointment. Late in the night he walked back from the hills. There was a light in one of her rear windows, and he peered eagerly from the garden fence, hoping to catch a glimpse of her. When Yank began to bark, he threw stones at the faithful brute and stood his ground, trusting that she would come to the door. He cursed when old Mrs. Crane appeared in the yard, calling in frightened tones to the dog. Then he slunk away in the night. The next day and the next he strode through the meadow. With each failure he grew uglier and more set in his purpose, for he had a fair certainty that she saw and avoided him.
One evening he ventured across the meadow, his black eyes searching for her. Suddenly he came upon her. She was driving a cow home from a far corner of the pasture, leisurely, in the waning daylight, her thoughts of Jud and the future. She did not see Crawley until he was almost beside her, and she could not restrain the gasp of terror. Hoping that he would not speak to her, she hurried on.
"Have you heerd from Jud ag'in, Justine?" he asked, his voice trembling in spite of himself.
"How dare you speak to me?" she cried, not checking her speed, nor glancing toward him.
"Well, I guess I've got a voice an' they ain't no law ag'in me usin' it, is there? What's the use bein' so unfriendly, anyhow? I'll drive the cow in fer you, Justine," he went on with a strange bashfulness.
His stride toward her brought her to a standstill, her eyes flashing with resentment.
"'Gene Crawley, you've been ordered to keep off of our place and I want you to stay off. If you ever put your foot in this pasture again I'll sic' Yank on you. Don't you ever dare speak to me again." She drew her form to its full height and looked into his face.
"If you sic' Yank on me I'll kill him, jes' as I could 'a' killedhimwhen we fit over yander by the crick. I let him up fer your sake an' I've been sorry fer it ever sence. Say, Justine, I want to be your friend——"
"Friend!" she exclaimed scornfully. "You're a treacherous dog and you don't deserve to have a friend on earth. If you were a man you'd keep off this place and quit bothering me. You know that Jud's away and you are coward enough to take the advantage. I want you togo—go at once!"
"You ain't got no right to call me a coward," he growled.
"Do you think it brave to say what you did about me and to make your boasts down at the toll-gate? Is that the way a man acts?"
"Somebody's been lyin' to you——" he began confusedly.
"No! You did say it and there's no use lying to me. I loathe you worse than a snake, and I wouldn't trust you as far. 'Gene Crawley, I've got a loaded shotgun in the house. So help me God, I'll kill you if you don't keep away from me."
She was in deadly earnest and he knew it. The rage of despair burned away every vestige of the brutal confidence in which he had intruded upon her little domain.
"I'm not such a bad feller, Justine——" he began, with a mixture of defiance and humbleness in his voice. It was now dark and they were alone, but she commanded the situation despite her quaking heart.
"You lie, 'Gene Crawley!" she exclaimed. "You are a drunken brute, and you don't deserve to be spoken to by any woman. You are not fit to talk to—to—to the hogs!"
He clenched his fists and an oath sprang to his lips. "I've a notion to——" he hissed, but could not complete the threat. The suppressed words were "brain you."
"I expect you to," she cried. "Why don't you do it, you coward?" He glared at her for a moment, baffled. Suddenly his eyes fell, his shoulders trembled, and his voice broke.
"I wouldn't hurt you for the whole world, Justine." He turned and walked away from her without another word.
'Gene Crawley never touched liquor after that night. "Not fit to talk to the hogs," "a drunken brute," were sentences that curdled in his heart, freezing forever the lust of liquor. He was beginning to crave the respect of a woman. Deep in his soul lay the hope that if he could only cease drinking he might win more than respect from her.
It was six weeks before Jud had saved enough money to make the rather expensive trip to Glenville. In that time he found many experiences, novel and soul-trying. The busy city clashed against the rough edges of this unsophisticated youth and quickly wore them off. By the time he was ready to board the train for a two-days' stay with Justine he had acquired what it had taken other men years to learn. Keen and quick-witted, he easily fell into the ways of strangers, putting forward as good a foot as any country-bred boy who ever went to Chicago.
The newspaper on which he was employed recognized his worth, and at the end of the month he was pleased beyond all expression to find a twenty dollar gold piece in his envelope instead of a ten and a five. The chief artist told him his salary would improve correspondingly with his work. Still, he realized that twenty dollars a week was but little more than it required to keep him "going" in this spendthrift metropolis. The men he met were good fellows and they spent money with the freedom customary among newspaper workers. Jud did not spend his foolishly, yet he found he could save but little. He did not touch liquor; the other boys in the office did. His friend, the chief artist, advised him to save what money he could, but to avoid as much as possible the danger of being called a "cheap skate." He was told to be anything but stingy.
The young artist would gladly have eaten at lunch counters and slept in the lowliest of flats if he could have followed his own inclinations. But how could he let the other boys spend money on expensive meals without responding as liberally? It was with joy, then, that he welcomed the increase; and besides, it proved to him that there was promise of greater advancement, and that at no far distant day he could bring Justine to the city.
He took a bright twenty dollar gold piece to her on that first and long-expected visit. She met him at the station. All the way out to the little cottage he beamed with the pleasure and pride of possessing such love as came to him from this glowing girl. He forgot to compare her with the visions of loveliness he had become accustomed to seeing in the city. So overjoyed was he that he did not notice her simple garments, her sunburnt hands, her brown face. To him she was the most beautiful of all beings—the most perfect, the most to be desired.
"Jud, dear, I am so happy I could die," she whispered as they entered the cottage door after the drive home. He took her in his arms and held her for neither knew how long.
"Are you so glad to see me, sweetheart?" he asked tenderly.
"Glad! If you had not come to-day I should have gone to Chicago to-night. I could not have waited another day. Oh, it is so good to have you here; it is so good to be in your arms! You don't know how I have longed for you, Jud;—you don't know how lonely I have been all these years."
"Years! It has been but a month and a half," he said, smiling.
"But each day has been a year. Have they not seemed long to you?" she cried, chilled by the fear that they had been mere days to him when they had been such ages to her.
"My nights were years, Justine. My days were short; it was in the nights that I had time to think, and then I felt I should go wild with homesickness. You will never know how often I was tempted to get up out of bed and come back to you. It can't be long, it must not, till I can have you up there with me. I can't go through many such months as the last one; I'd die, Justine, honest I would."
"It won't be long, I know. You are getting on so nicely and you'll be able soon to take me with you. Maybe this winter?" She asked the question eagerly, dubiously.
"This winter? Good heavens, if I can't have you up there this winter, what's the use of trying to do anything? I want you right away, but I know I can't do it for a month or two——"
"Don't hope too strongly, dear. You must not count on it. I don't believe you can do it so soon—no, not for six months," she said, again the loving adviser.
"You don't know me," he cried. "I can do it!"
"I hope you can, Jud, but—but, I am afraid——"
"Afraid? Don't you believe in me?"
"Don't say that, please. I am afraid you won't be ready to have me up there as a—a——"
"A what, sweetheart?"
"A very heavy burden."
"Burden! Justine, you will lift the greatest burden I will have to carry—my spirits. I need you, and I'll have you if I starve myself."
"When you are ready, Jud, I'll go with you. You can tell when the time comes. I'll starve with you, if needs be."
That night they received callers in the fire-lit front room. The whole community knew that he was at home, and everybody came to sate legitimate curiosity. Some talked, others joked, a few stared; until at length the township was satisfied and hurried home to bed. For days the people talked of the change they had observed in Jud—not so much in respect to his clothes as to his advanced ideas. "Aleck" Cranby was authority for the statement that Sherrod was engaged in "drawin' picters fer a dictionary. Thet's how he knows so all-fired much."
The young artist's brief stay at home was the most blissful period in his life and in hers. They were separated only for moments. When the time came for him to go away he went with a cheerier heart and he left a happier one behind. In their last kiss there was the promise that he would return in a month, and there was, back of all, the conviction that she would go with him to Chicago within six months. On the train, however, he allowed gloomy thoughts to drive away the optimism that contact with Justine had inspired. He realized that every dollar he possessed in the world was in his pocket, and he had just six dollars and thirty cents. At such a rate, how much could he accumulate in six short months?
Back on the little farm there was a level-headed thinker who was counting on a year instead of six months, and who was racking her brains for means with which to help him in the struggle. One good crop would be a godsend.
For several weeks Jud observed the strictest economy. When next he went to the farm for a visit it was with sixty dollars. Most of this he gave to Justine, who hid it in a bureau drawer. Winter was on in full blast now, and he did not forget to purchase a warm coat for her, besides heavy dress-goods, underwear, and many little necessities. Thanksgiving saw her dressed in better clothes than she had known since those almost forgotten days of affluence before the mining swindle. Jud, himself, was not too warmly clad. He refused to buy clothes for himself until he had supplied Justine with all she needed. His suit was old but neat, his shoes were new, his hat was passable, but his overcoat was pitiful in its old age.
The night after his return from the farm, he had a few good friends in his room to eat the apples, cakes, and nuts which his wife had given him at home. It was a novel feast for the Chicago boys. Ned Draper, a dramatic critic, had money in the new suit of clothes which graced his person, and he sent out for wine, beer and cigars. The crowd made merry until two o'clock, but not one drop of liquor passed Jud's lips.
"Sherrod, where did you get that overcoat I saw you wearing to-day?" asked Draper, in friendly banter. Jud flushed, but answered steadily: "In Glenville."
"The glorious metropolis of Clay township—the city of our youth," laughed Hennessy, the police reporter.
"You ought to pension it and give it a pair of crutches," went on Draper. "It has seen service enough and it's certainly infirm. I'll swear, I don't see how it manages to hang alone."
"It's the best I can afford," cried the owner, resentfully.
"Aw, what are you givin' us? You're getting twenty a week and you're to have thirty by Christmas—if you're good, you know,—and I would blow myself for some clothes. Hang it, old man, I mean it for your own good. People will think more of you if you spruce up and make a showing. Those clothes of yours don't fit and they're worn out. You don't know what a difference it will make in your game if you make a flash with yourself. It gets people thinking you're a peach, when you may be a regular stiff. Go blow yourself for some clothes, and the next time you chase down to Glenville to see that girl she'll break her neck to marry you before you can get out of town. On the level, now, old man, I'm giving it to you straight. Tog up a bit. It doesn't cost a mint and it does help. I'll leave it to the crowd."
"The crowd" supported Draper, and Jud could but see the wisdom in their advice, although his pride rebelled against their method of giving it. The sight of the other men in the office dressing well, if not expensively, while he remained as ever the wearer of the rankest "hand-me-downs," had not been pleasing. For weeks he had been tempted to purchase a cheap suit of clothes at one of the big department stores, but the thought of economy prevented.
"You haven't any special expense," said Colton, the third guest. "Nobody depends on your salary but yourself, so why don't you cut loose? Your parents are dead, just as mine are, and you are as free as air. I can put you next to one of the best tailors in Chicago and he'll fix you out to look like a dream without skinning you to death."
Jud smiled grimly when Colton said that no one but himself depended on his salary. These fellows did not know he was married. An unaccountable fear that they might ridicule him if he posed as a married man who could not support his wife had caused him to keep silent concerning his domestic affairs. Besides, he had heard these and other men speak of certain wives, often in the presence of their husbands, in a manner which shocked him. No one had asked him if he were married and he did not volunteer the information. It amused him hugely when his new acquaintances teased him about "his girl down in old Clay." Some day he would surprise them by introducing them to Justine, calmly, in a matter-of-fact way, and then he would laugh at their incredulity.
"I can't afford clothes like you fellows wear," he said in response to Colton's offer.
"Of course, you can—just as well as I can," said Colton.
"Or any one of us," added Draper. "Clothes won't break anybody."
"You're a good-looking chap, Sherrod, and if you dressed up a bit you'd crack every girl's heart in Chicago. 'Gad, I can see the splinters flying now," cried Hennessy, admiringly.
"It's no joke," added Colton. "I could tog you out till you'd——"
"But I haven't the money, consarn it," cried the victim, a country boy all over again. They laughed at his verdancy, and it all ended by Colton agreeing to vouch for him at the tailor's, securing for him the privilege of paying so much a month until the account was settled.
Jud lay awake nights trying to decide the matter. He knew that he needed the clothes and that it was time to cast aside the shabby curiosities from Glenville. He saw that he was to become an object of ridicule if he persisted in wearing them. Pride demanded good clothes, that he might not be ashamed to be seen with well-dressed men; something else told him that he should save every penny for a day that was to come as soon as he could bring it about. At last he went to Colton and asked him what he thought the clothes would cost, first convincing himself that tailor-made garments were the only kind to be considered.
Colton hurried him off to the tailor, and within an hour he was on the street again, dazed and aware that he had made a debt of one hundred and thirty dollars. He was to have two suits of clothes, business and dress, and an overcoat. For a week he was miserable, and a dozen times he was tempted to run in and countermand the order. How could he ever pay it? What would Justine think? At length the garments were completed and he found them at his hall door. Attached was a statement for $130, with the information that he was to pay $10 a month, "a very gracious concession as a favor to our esteemed friend, Mr. Colton," said the accompanying note. In a fever of excitement he tried them on. The fit was perfect; he looked like other men. Still, his heart was heavy. That night, taking up his old cast-off suit, he mourned over the greasy things that he and Justine had selected at Dave Green's store the week before they were married. They were his wedding clothes.
"I'll keep them forever," he half sobbed, and he hung them away carefully. The time came for his next visit to the little farm. In his letters he had said nothing about the new clothes, but he had admitted that unexpected expenses had come upon him. He could not bring himself to tell her of that extravagance. He believed that she would have approved, but he shrank from the confession.
When he boarded the train for the trip home, he was dressed in the clothes he had first worn to Chicago, the greasy wedding garments. He never forgot how guilty he felt when she told him the next evening, as they sat before the old fireplace, that he should buy a new overcoat and a heavy suit of clothes. And after he went away on Monday she wondered why he had been so quiet and preoccupied during his visit.