The Californians Part 15

Magdalena did not answer her. She was staring at her father, breathless for his next words.

"The ladies never write," announced that grandson of old Spain. "Nor the gentlemens. Always the common peoples write the books."

"Oh, it's better now, really," said Rose. "Some people that write are said to be quite nice. Of course, one doesn't meet them in society,--in San Francisco society, at least,--but that may be the fault of society."

"Of course," said Tiny. "I do not mean that people who write must be horrid. But I think I couldn't know a woman who made her name so public,--I mean if I hadn't been fond of her before; but I should really _hate_ to see a friend's name in print. You are not really thinking of writing a book, are you, Rose, dear?"

"I have not the slightest idea of writing a book--for the very good reason that I haven't brains enough. You needn't worry about any of us adding to the glory of California--unless, to be sure, 'Lena should be clever enough."

She spoke at random, and Magdalena's face did not betray her; but she almost hated the girl who was forcing her to another of her mental crises.

"My daughter write!" shouted Don Roberto. "A Yorba! She make a fool de my name like the play-actor that do the monkey tricks on the stage? Si she do that--"

"Here comes Mr. Trennahan," said Magdalena, standing up. "Mamma is not here. I must go to meet him."

Trennahan threw the reins to his groom and sprang out of the cart. "I could not wait till evening, you see," he said, as he came up the steps.

"What is the matter? Something has gone wrong with you."

She s.h.i.+vered. "Yes. Something. I cannot tell you."

"Can we have our ride to-morrow?"

"Yes, I can ride with you. Don't, d-don't--"

"Yes?"

"Don't talk to me when you get round there."

"I won't; and I won't let them talk to you."

Something _has_ gone wrong, he thought. She looks like a condemned criminal.

XXV

The next morning when Trennahan rode up, Magdalena was already on her horse, and they cantered off at once.

"I must teach you to trot," he said. "This is very old-fas.h.i.+oned. You must not be behind your friends, who would scorn to canter."

"Very well. You can teach me."

The next half-hour was given up to the lesson. Magdalena did not like the new method, but persevered heroically. A half-hour was all she could endure, and they cantered across the meadows to the back woods.

Magdalena was as pale as a swarthy person can be. Her eyes were heavy and shadowed.

"You did not sleep last night," said Trennahan, abruptly. "And something had happened yesterday before I came. What was it?"

"I don't think I can tell you. I don't like to talk about things--about myself."

"Then let me tell you that no human being can go through life without help. With all your brain and your natural reticence, you are no exception to the rule. I am much older than you are. I know a great deal of the world. You know nothing of it. I can help you if you will let me."

He was interested, and thought it probable that her trouble came from the depths of her nature. Nevertheless, she was very young, and he prayed that her grief were not the sequence of a rejected ma.n.u.script.

Magdalena flushed, then paled again. She remembered that she had wanted to speak out to him; but face to face with the prospect, the levelling of lifelong barriers appalled her. If she could only tell part and conceal the rest! But she was no artist in words. She drew a deep sigh and opened her lips, but closed them again.

"It will be easier here in the woods," he said, as they rode into the deep shade. "The world always seems quite different to me in a wood." It did not in the least, but he knew that it did to her.

"I should have to go back," she said finally. "I cannot begin with yesterday. And I talk so badly."

"The longer the story, the more interested I shall be. And I like your direct simplicity. Let us walk the horses."

"When I was a child I was very religious,--a Catholic. It was a very great deal to me. When I prayed to the Virgin about my wants and troubles, I felt quite happy and hopeful. I lost it a year or two ago. I had read a great many scientific books; and my religion fell to pieces like--like--There was a beautiful old tree on the edge of the woods once. It looked as if it would stand a century longer. One day there was a terrible wind, and it fell down. Its sap and roots were almost gone. I felt dreadfully--about the religion, I mean. I felt, somehow, as if my backbone had been taken out. I knew that one must have some sort of moral ideal. I thought a great deal, and finally I determined to make my conscience my religion. I made a resolution that I would never do, and try not even to think, what I believed to be wrong. When I was little, I followed Helena into a great many of her naughty escapades,--though nothing so bad as the fire,--and I did not tell my parents, as a rule, because I could not see that it did any good. When my New England conscience, as Helena calls it, got the best of me and I confessed about the fire, the consequences were so terrible that I made up my mind that I would do as I chose and say nothing about it. I kept to that until I lost my religion. Then I was careful about every little thing. It was easy enough for a year. Then--I don't think I can go on."

"Then you wrote a book and your conscience hurts you because you have not told your parents."

Magdalena dropped her reins and stared at him. Had a voice leapt down from heaven, she could not have been more dumfounded.

"I never told you," she said helplessly. "Can all the others know too?"

"I am positive that no one suspects but myself. Do go on."

"You have guessed something, but not all. I have only begun a book; and I am so ignorant, and my mind is so slow, that I know it will be years before I shall be able to write a book that anybody would read. At first this dismayed me. Now I do not care, so long as I succeed in the end; and it will be a pleasure to see myself improve. I have not thought it wrong not to tell my parents, so long as what I did could not affect them in any way. Do you not think I was right in that?"

"a.s.suredly."

"I believed that when I had done something excellent, if that time ever came, they would be proud of it. My mother was a school-teacher, you know; and I did not see why my father should care. He hates to hear women talk, but writing is different. At least I thought so. Yesterday, just before you came, the subject came up. Rose said she believed I could write a book, and papa was furious at the mere thought. I knew nothing about old-world prejudices, but it seems that a lady would be thought to have disgraced herself in Spain if she wrote a book: and papa is as Spanish as if he had never learned a word of English, although he would be ready to beat anyone that told him so. He did not have a chance to say much yesterday; but I saw what his ideas were and that nothing could change them.

"I did not go to sleep at all last night. I sat up trying to think what I should do. Of course I need not tell him what I had done; but should I give it up? That was the question. If I continued, I must tell him of my intention to be a writer. He would forbid it. If I refused to obey, which I do not think I have any right to do, he is quite capable of locking me up. But I cannot go on writing in secret. That would be a great wrong; it would be living a lie. I could not make myself believe that I only wrote for the pleasure of writing: I should know that I longed for the time when I should see my book on somebody's shelf. It seems to me that I cannot give it up. I have much less in my life than most girls. In spite of the hard work, I have felt almost happy while writing. And I am afraid that I have as much ambition as pride. But he is my father. My first duty is to him--I cannot make up my mind. I suppose there should be no struggle; but there is, and I feel as if it were killing me."

Trennahan had been the confidant of many women, had listened to many tragic confessions, had seen women in agonies of remorse; but nothing had ever touched him as did this bald statement, abrupt with repressed feeling, of a girl's solitary tragedy. Had her hero been a lover instead of an art, he would have met her confidence with plat.i.tudes and a suppressed yawn; but her lonely att.i.tude in the midst of millions and friends, her terrible slavery to an ideal, to a scourging conscience which was at war with all the secretiveness, self-indulgence, and haughty intolerance of restraint which she had inherited with her father's blood, interested him even more profoundly than it appealed to his sympathies. He determined not only to help her, but to watch her development.

"You have honoured me with your confidence," he said. "Don't doubt for a moment that I do not appreciate the magnitude of that honour. I know just how proud and reticent you are, how much it cost you to speak. I believe that I have enough wisdom to help you a little. Go on with your work. If you have a talent, you get it, one way or another, from your parents, and it is as much ent.i.tled to your consideration as your health or your riches. The birthright of every mortal is happiness. Some philosopher has said that happiness is the free exercise of the higher faculties of a man's nature. If that is your instinct, pursue it. Of course we have no right to claim our happiness at the expense of others.

But your father is safe for the present. No matter what your talent, you will not know enough, nor have had sufficient bare practice with your pen, to write even a short story of first-rate merit for ten years to come. You may count it a blessing that various causes are preventing you from rus.h.i.+ng into print. At the end of that period your father will be ten years older. He will probably be much softened and will look at things differently; or he may be dead. Or you may be--and most likely will be--married. You need only concern yourself with the present. It is possible that you have discovered your only chance of happiness. Do not commit the incredible folly of strangling that chance before it is born.

This is not my day for lecturing, but I am going to take your conscience in hand. It needs training. Before you know it, you will be morbid. That means brain rot, and no chance of the commonest sort of enjoyment."

"You are very good; no one has ever been so good. You ought to know far better than I what is right and what is wrong."

"I am afraid I do. Promise me this: that you will do nothing decisive until the end of the summer. Take that time to think it over. There will be little time to write in any case. I shall monopolise a good deal of your time, and I fancy they intend to be rather gay here. Six months from now we will talk it over again. Will you agree to that?"

"I must think it over. My mind is a slow one. But I think you are right."

And several days later, when he was dining at the house, she told him briefly that she should take his advice and write no more until the summer was over.