Rose of Dutcher's Coolly Part 42

"There you have it," he ended. He struck the ashes out of his pipe and rose.

"I could marry her, but it wouldn't make her happy. It would make her suffer. It is not a light thing to decide. It is a very grave thing. As in the case of the sculptress I thought it an error of judgment on her part, and on my own it would be criminal."

"That's a fine bit of fiction," said Sanborn. "You're too rough on yourself, for you could do the girl a deal of good by marrying her."

"Possibly. In the case of the sculptress the problem is different. She is moving past me like a queen--splendid, supple, a smile of conscious power on her lips, the light of success in her eyes. It's a terrible temptation, I admit, this power to stretch out my hand and stay her. It makes my blood leap, but my sense of justice will not allow of it. I shall let her pa.s.s on, beautiful and rapt."

"To marry some confounded pin-head, who will make her a domestic animal, and degrade her into 'my wife, gents'?"

"Possibly. However, my responsibility ends where I say good-bye."

"Don't s.h.i.+rk--don't s.h.i.+rk."

Mason turned on him. His voice lost a little of its coldness.

"Is a man to have no credit for letting such a glorious creature pa.s.s him, unharmed and free?"

"Why yes, certainly. But the world of art will not satisfy that girl.

She's sure to marry--she _must_ marry--and she is ent.i.tled to more consideration. You've got to look ahead to the time when she regrets the lack of husband and children."

"Ah, but it's a frightful thing, Sanborn, to arrest that girl, to make her a wife and mother, to watch her grow distorted, stiffened, heavy with child-bearing. I prefer to see her pa.s.s me, in order that I may remember her, lithe, radiant, moving like music and light."

"That's fine, Mason, I honor you for that spirit," said Sanborn, deeply moved. "But you must remember I am about to be married to a beautiful woman myself, a woman who knows both s.e.xes, knows their vices and pa.s.sions. She tells me, and it fits in with what I know myself, that the woman's nature moves on from this beautiful state you've described so well, into the pain and responsibility of marriage not merely willingly, but eagerly. Half the girl's joy, which we men see in her face, is the smile of antic.i.p.ated motherhood--it must be so. Isabel, as you know, is no sentimentalist; she's a woman you can talk these things to, freely. I can't state it as she did, but the substance of it was this: if the girl knew she was to be always young and childish, her youth and beauty would be of no value to her--that it is the untried pain and pleasures of other years and conditions which make the beauty so radiant now."

"All of which merely means she makes the best of an irresistible and tragic impulse, a force which she does not originate and cannot control.

Therefore I say it is a sorrowful business to hew down a temple or tear a lily in pieces."

The two men were silent again. They had reached fundamentals in their talk. Sanborn considered the whole matter an allegory, which Mason was using to veil his design to win Rose if possible. He knew the ease of Mason's invention, as well as his power to present a case dramatically, and while he was moved by the expression of his friend's n.o.ble thought, he could not think that there was any exact truth contained in the story.

Mason resumed a moment later:

"There are certain other material, minor and prosaic considerations which must be kept in mind. Suppose I announce my engagement to Miss Aurelia; the newspapers would have a pleasant paragraph or two. Some people would say 'what a very appropriate match.' Others would say very knowingly, 'Well, Mason has feathered his nest.' The newspaper boys who really wish me well would say, 'Good for Mason; now he can take time to finish that great American novel he's had on hand so long!' A few shrewd fellows would say, 'Well, that ends Mason! He's naturally lazy, and with a wife and home like that he'll never do another stroke of work. Mason's like Coleridge in one thing: he dreams great things, but never writes them. He's out of the race!'"

"There's something in that," Sanborn admitted.

"I know there is," Mason replied without offense. "Now we'll suppose I sc.r.a.pe a little money together for immediate use. The old railway Baron is kind. He tolerates me for the daughter's sake. I come in contact with the relatives; already I have had a touch of them! A girl like that is not like a pebble on the sea-sh.o.r.e; she's a thread in a web of cloth, a silken thread in a breadth of shoddy, maybe. You can't marry her and have her to yourself. You come into new relations with her people as her _fiance_. They cannot be escaped. They swarm around you. They question your motives and they comment on your person: 'He's getting bent and bald;' 'He's lazy;' 'What did she ever see in him?' They vulgarize everything they touch. They are as tiresome as the squeal of a pump, but there you are, you must meet them. The old gentleman is a man who deals in millions, reliable and conscientious. He talks to you about his business, till you say, 'business be d.a.m.ned.' He thereafter meets you in heavy silence. The mother is a timid soul, with an exaggerated idea of your importance as an editor. The aunts and uncles variously sniff and tremble before you."

"Meanwhile your wife has talked all she knows, and all she says thereafter has a familiar sound. She delights in stories with many repet.i.tions in them. Her little brain travels from the pantry to the table, from the tea table to the children's bath tub; its widest circuit is the millinery store and the bargain counter. She gets fat, that's another distressing phase of my trouble, let me say. I seem to be gifted with a prophetic eye in the midst of my transports--"

"Think of you in a transport!"

"I am able to see just how each one will change, how this pretty plumpness will get fat, how this delicate slimness will get bony. I see how this beautiful alert face will get beakish. In other words I am troubled about the future, when I should be involved only in the ecstasy of the present. In this latest case I see excessive plumpness and chatter in ten years. I see myself bored to death with her within ten months. She is at her best now; in striving to win me she is like a female bird, her plumage is at its best; she will grow dowdy when the incentive is gone.

"There are other considerations. Aurelia, too, has exaggerated notions of my power to earn money. She may expect me to maintain an expensive establishment. I can't ask anything of the political pirate, her father; I can only put my income into the treasury. If my power to earn money decreases, as it may, then I become an object of contempt on the part of the old savage, who considers money the measure of ability. Suppose at last I come to the point of borrowing money, of going to the old man humbly, twisting my hat in my hand: 'My dear sir, Aurelia and the children'--Pah!"

He uttered a sound of disgust and anger and fell silent.

Sanborn mused, "I wonder if the lovers of any other age had any such scruples about marriage. I guess you're right about Aurelia, but I don't believe you are about the sculptress. I think she would make you happy."

Mason mused a moment and then went on:

"Well, now, as to that--marry her and we plunge, inside of two years, into a squalid struggle for bread and coal and a roof. I elect myself at once into the ranks of dray-horses, and, as I said before, I chain a genius to the neck-yoke with me. That is also out of the question."

Sanborn sought his hat.

"Well, Mason, this has been a season of plain speaking. I'd feel pretty bad over it if I thought it was real. When you get the whole thing typewritten I should like to read it to Isabel and Rose."

Mason's face did not change, but he failed to look at his friend. He said quietly:

"Isabel wouldn't read it; the girl might possibly find something in it of value. Good night; you've listened like a martyr."

"Don't fail to write that out while it's fresh in your mind. Good night," said Sanborn.

His last glance as he closed the door fell upon a lonely figure lying in a low chair before the fire, and he pitied him. Mason seemed "the great irresolute" which Isabel believed him to be; helpless to do, patient to suffer.

CHAPTER XXII

SOCIAL QUESTIONS

The social world seemed about to open to the coule girl. At Mrs.

Harvey's she called, and behold! her house was but one street removed from the Lake Sh.o.r.e Drive, on which she had stood that September day. It was a home of comfort rather than of wealth, not at all ostentatious, and yet its elegance troubled Rose not a little.

She knew values by instinct, and she knew there was nothing shoddy and nothing carelessly purchased in the room. The Harveys were envied by some of their wealthier neighbors for the harmoniousness of their house.

They contrived to make their furniture distinguish itself from a down-town stock--which requires taste in selection, and arrangement as well.

Rose heard voices above, and soon Mrs. Harvey and Isabel came down together. Rose was glad of her friend's presence--it made it easier for her.

After hearty greetings from Mrs. Harvey they all sat down and Mrs.

Harvey said:

"I'm glad you came over. We--Isabel and I--feel that we should do something for you socially. I would like to have you come over some Wednesday and pour tea for me. It's just my afternoon at home, and friends drop in and chatter a little while; perhaps you'd enjoy it."

"O, you're very kind!" Rose said, dimly divining that this was a valuable privilege, "but I really couldn't do it. I--I'm not up to that."

"O, yes, you are. You'd look like a painting by Boldini up against that tapestry, with your hair brought low, the way you wore it concert night."

Isabel put in a word. "It isn't anything to scare you, Rose. It's hardly more formal than at college, only there won't be any men. It will introduce you to some nice girls, and we'll make it as easy for you as we can."

"O, yes, indeed; you can sit at the table with Isabel."

"O, it isn't that," Rose said, looking down. "I haven't anything suitable to wear." She went on quickly, as if to put an end to the whole matter. "I'm a farmer's girl living on five hundred dollars a year, and I can't afford fifty dollar dresses. I haven't found out any way to earn money, and I can't ask my father to buy me clothes to wear at teas. You all are very kind to me, but I must tell you that it's all out of my reach."

The other women looked at each other while Rose hurried through this.

Mrs. Harvey was prepared at the close: