Over the Pass

by Frederick Palmer

  XXXIII

  PRATHER SEES THE PORTRAIT

  It did not occur to Jack to question a word of the narrative that hadreduced a dismal enigma to luminous, connected facts. With the swiftprocesses of reason and the promptness of decision of which he wascapable on occasion, he had made up his mind as to his future even as heascended the stairs to his room. The poignancy of his father's appeal hadstruck to the bed-rock of his affection and his conscience, revealingduty not as a thing that you set for yourself, but which circumstancesset for you.

  Never before had he realized how hopelessly he had been a dreamer. Firio,P.D., Wrath of God, and Jag Ear became the fantastic memory of anotherincarnation. His devil should never again rejoice in having his finger ona trigger or send him off an easy traveller in search of gorgeoussunrises. His devil should be transformed into a backbone of unremittingapprenticeship in loving service for the father who had built for him inlove. Though his head split, he would master every detail of thebusiness. And when Jack stepped into the Rubicon he did not splash aroundor look back. He went right over to the new country on the other bank.

  But there were certain persons whom he must inform of the crossing.First, he wrote a telegram to Jim Galway: "Sorry, but overwhelming dutyhere will not permit. Luck and my prayers with you." Then to Firio aletter, which did not come quite so easily: "You see by now that you aremistaken, Firio. I am not coming back. Make the most of the ranch--yourranch--that you can." The brevity, he told himself, was in keeping withFirio's own style. Besides, anything more at length would have opened upan avenue of recollections which properly belonged to oblivion.

  And Mary? Yes, he would write to her, too. He would cut the last strandwith the West. That was best. That was the part of his new courage ofself-denial stripping itself of every trammeling association ofsentiment. Other men had given up the women of their choice; and he couldnever be the man of this woman's choice. Somehow, his father's talk hadmade him realize an inevitable outcome which had better be met andmastered in present fortitude, rather than after prolonged years offruitless hope centering two thousand miles away. He started a dozenletters to Mary, meaning each to be a fitting _envoi_ to theircomradeship and a song of good wishes. Each one he wrote in the haste ofhaving the task quickly over, only to throw away what he had written whenhe read it. The touch that he wanted would not come. He was simplyflashing out a few of a thousand disconnected thoughts that ran awayincoherently with his pen.

  But wasn't any letter, any communication of any kind, superfluous? Wasn'tit the folly of weak and stupid stubbornness? She had spoken her finalword in their relations at the hotel door. There was no Little Rivers;there was no Mary; there was nothing but the store. To enforce this fiathe had only to send the wire to Jim and post the letter to Firio. This hewould do himself. A stroll would give him fresh air. It was just what heneeded after all he had been through that evening; and he would see thestreets not with any memory of the old restlessness when he and hisfather were strangers, but kindly, as the symbol of the future.

  His room was on the second floor. As he left it, he heard the door-bellring, its electric titter very clear in the silence of the house. Nodoubt it meant a telegram for his father. At the turn of the stairs onthe first floor he saw the back of the butler before the open door.Evidently it was not a matter of a telegram, but of some late caller.Jack paused in the darkness of the landing, partly to avoid the bother ofhaving to meet anyone and partly arrested by the manner of the butler,who seemed to be startled and in doubt about admitting a stranger at thathour. Indistinctly, Jack could hear the caller's voice. The tone wasfamiliar in a peculiar quality, which he tried to associate with a voicethat he had heard frequently. The butler, apparently satisfied with thecaller's appearance, or, at least, with his own ability to take care of asingle intruder, stepped back, with a word to come in. Then, out of theobscurity of the vestibule, appeared the pale face of John Prather. Jackwithdrew farther into the shadows instinctively, as if he had seen aghost; as if, indeed, he were in fear of ghosts.

  "I will take your card to Mr. Wingfield," said the butler.

  Prather made a perfunctory movement as if for a card-case, butapparently changed his mind under the prompting suggestion that it wassuperfluous.

  "My name is John Prather," he announced. "Mr. Wingfield knows who I amand I am quite sure that he will see me."

  While the butler, after rapping cautiously, went into the library withthe message, John Prather stood half smiling to himself as he lookedaround the hall. The effect seemed to please him in a contemplativefashion, for he rubbed the palms of his hands together, as he had in hissurvey of the diamond counters. He was serenity itself as John Wingfield,Sr. burst out of the library, his face hard-set.

  "I thought you were going this evening!" he exclaimed. "By what right doyou come here?"

  He placed himself directly in front of Prather, thus hiding Prather'sfigure, but not his face, which Jack could see was not in the leastdisturbed by the other's temper.

  "Oh, no! The early morning train has the connections I want for Arizona,"he answered casually, as if he were far from being in any hurry. "I wastaking a walk, and happening to turn into Madison Avenue I found myselfin front of the house. It occurred to me what a lot I had heard aboutthat ancestor, and seeing a light in the library, and considering howlate it was, I thought I might have a glimpse of him withoutinconveniencing any other member of the family. Do you mind?"

  He put the question with an inflection that was at once engaging andconfident.

  "Mind!" gasped John Wingfield, Sr.

  "I am sure you do not!" Prather returned. Now a certain deference and acertain pungency of satire ran together in his tone, the mixture beingnicely and pleasurably controlled. "Is it in there, in the drawing-room?"

  "And then what else? Where do you mean to end? I thought that--"

  "Nothing else," Prather interrupted reassuringly. "Everything is settled,of course. This is sort of a farewell privilege."

  "Yes, in there!" snapped John Wingfield, Sr. "It's the picture on theother side of the mantel. I will wait here--and be quick, quick, I tellyou! I want you out of this house! I've done enough! I--"

  "Thanks! It is very good-natured of you!"

  John Prather passed leisurely into the drawing-room and John Wingfield,Sr. stood guard by the door, his hand gripping the heavy portieres forsupport, while his gaze was steadily fixed at a point in the turn of thestairs just below where Jack was obscured in the shadow. His face wasdrawn and ashen against the deep red of the hangings, and torment andfear and defiance, now one and then the other, were in ascendency overthe features which Jack had always associated with composed andunchanging mastery until he had seen them illumined with affection onlyan hour before. And the father had said that he had never met or heard ofJohn Prather! The father had said so quietly, decidedly, withouthesitation! This one thought kept repeating itself to Jack's stunnedbrain as he leaned against the wall limp from a blow that admits of noaggressive return.

  "The ancestor certainly must have been a snappy member of society in histime! It has been delightful to have a look at him," said John Prather,as he came out of the drawing-room.

  He paused as he spoke. He was still smiling. The mole on his cheek wastoward the stairway; and it seemed to heighten the satire of his smile.The faces of the young man and the old man were close together and theywere standing in much the same attitude, giving an effect of likeness inmore than physiognomy. That note of John Prather's voice that had soundedso familiar to Jack was a note in the father's voice when he wasparticularly suave.

  "This is the end--that is the understanding--the end?" demanded JohnWingfield, Sr.

  "Oh, quite!" John Prather answered easily, moving toward the door. Hedid not offer his hand, nor did John Wingfield, Sr. offer to take it.But as he went out he said, his smile broadening: "I hope that Jackmakes a success with the store, though he never could run it as well asI could. Good-by!"

  "Good-by!" gasped John Wingfield, Sr.
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  He wheeled around distractedly and stood still, his head bowed, hisfingers working nervously before his hands parted in a shrugging,outspread gesture of relief; then, his head rising, his body stiffening,once more his arbitrary self, he started up the stairs with the firm yetelastic step with which he mounted the flights of the store.

  If Jack remained where he was they would meet. What purpose in questionsnow? The answer to all might be as false as to one. He was no more in amood to trust himself with a word to his father than he had been to trusthimself with a word to John Prather. He dropped back into the darknessof the dining-room and sank into a chair. When a bedroom door upstairshad closed softly he was sequestered in silence with his thoughts.

  His own father had lied to him! Lied blandly! Lied with eyes limpid withappeal! And the supreme commandment on which his mother had ever insistedwas truth. The least infraction of it she would not forgive; it was theonly thing for which she had ever punished him. He recalled the oneoccasion when she had seemed harsh and merciless, as she said:

  "A lie fouls the mouth of the one who utters it, Jack. A lie may tortureand kill. It may ruin a life. It is the weapon of the coward--and neverbe a coward, Jack, never be afraid!"

  At the New England preparatory school which he had attended after he camehome, a lie was the abomination on which the discipline of studentcomradeship laid a scourge. Out on the desert, where the trails runstraight and the battle of life is waged straight against thirst andfatigue and distance, men spoke straight.

  And nothing had been explained, after all! The phantom was back,definite of form and smiling in irony. For it had a face, now, the faceof John Prather! How was he connected with the story of the mother? thefather? the Doge?

  Then, like a shaft of light across memory, came the recollection of athing that had been so negligible to Jack at the time. It was Dr.Bennington's first question in Jack's living-room; a question socarelessly put and so dissociated from the object of his visit! Jackremembered Dr. Bennington's curious glance through his eyebrows as heasked him if he had met John Prather. And Dr. Bennington had brought Jackinto the world! He knew the family history! The Jack that now rose fromthe chair was a Jack of action, driven by the scourge of John Prather'ssmile into obsession with the one idea which was crying: "I will know! Iwill know!"

  Downstairs in the hall he learned over the telephone that Dr. Benningtonhad just gone out on a call. It would be possible to see him yetto-night! An hour later, as the doctor entered his reception-room he wasstartled by a pacing figure in the throes of impatience, who turned onhim without formality in an outburst:

  "Dr. Bennington, you asked me in Little Rivers if I had ever met JohnPrather. I have met him! Who is he? What is he to me?"

  The doctor's suavity was thrown off its balance, but he did not losehis presence of mind. He was too old a hand at his profession, toocapable, for that.

  "I refuse to answer!" he said quickly and decisively.

  "Then you do know!" Jack took a step toward the doctor. His weight was onthe ball of his foot; his eyes had the fire of a command that was not tobe resisted.

  "Heavens! How like the ancestor!" the doctor exclaimed involuntarily.

  "Then you do know! Who is he? What is he to me?"

  It seemed as if the ceiling were about to crack. The doctor looked awayto avoid the bore of Jack's unrelenting scrutiny. He took a turn up anddown, rapidly, nervously, his fingers pressed in against the palms andthe muscles of his forearms moving in the way of one who is trying tohold himself in control by an outward expression of force against inwardrebellion.

  "I dined with your father to-night!" he exclaimed. "I counseled him totell you the truth! I said that if he did not want to tell it for its ownsake, as policy it was the only thing to you! I--I--" he stopped, facingJack with a sort of grisly defiance. "Jack, a doctor is a confessor ofmen! He keeps their secrets! Good-night!" And he strode through theoffice door, which he closed behind him sharply, in reminder that theinterview was at an end.

  As Jack went down the steps into the night, the face of John Prather,with a satirical turn to the lips, was preceding him. Now he walked madlyup and down and back and forth across town to the river fronts, withpanting energy of stride, as he fastened the leash of will on quiveringnerves. When dawn came it was the dawn of the desert calling to a brainthat had fought its way to a lucid purpose. It started him to the storein the fervor of a grateful mission, while a familiar greeting keptrepeating itself in his ears on the way:

  "You won't forget, Jack, about giving me a chance to come along if youever go out West again, will you?"

  The question was one in answer to a promise; a reminder from certainemployees into whom he had fused his own spirit of enthusiasm about drywastes yielding abundance.

  "But you must work very hard," he had told them. "Not until you havecallouses on your hands can you succeed or really know how to enjoy adesert sunrise or sunset. After that, you will be able to stand erect andlook destiny in the face."

  "No February slush!" Burleigh, the fitter, had said. "No depending onone man to hold your job!"

  "Your own boss! You own some land and you just naturally get what youearn!" according to Joe Mathewson.

  "And from what I can make out," observed one of the automobile vandrivers whom Jack had accompanied on the suburban rounds, "it requiresabout as much brains as running an automobile to be what you'd call afirst-class, a number one desert Rube, Jack!"

  "Yes," Jack told him. "The process that makes the earth fruitful is notless complicated than a motor, simply because it is one of the earliestinventions. You mix in nature's carbureter light and moisture with thechemical elements of the soil."

  "I'm on!" the chauffeur rejoined. "If a man works with a plow instead ofa screwdriver, it doesn't follow that his mind is as vacant as a cow thatstands stockstill in the middle of the road to show you that you can'tfool her into thinking that radiators are good to eat."

  In explaining the labor and pains of orange-growing, which ended onlywith the careful picking and packing, Jack would talk as earnestly as hisfather would about the tedious detail which went into the purchase andsale of the articles in any department of the store. He might not be ableto choose the best expert for the ribbon counter, but he had a certainconfidence that he could tell the man or the woman who would make good inLittle Rivers. No manager was more thorough in his observation of clerksfor promotion than Jack in observing would-be ranchers. He had given hispromise to one after another of a test list of disciples; and at times hehad been surprised to find how serious both he and the disciples wereover a matter that existed entirely on the hypothesis that he was notgoing to stay permanently in New York.

  This morning he was at the store for the last time, arriving even beforethe delivery division, to circulate the news that he was returning toLittle Rivers. Trouble was brewing out there, he explained, but theycould depend on him. He would make a place for them and send word when hewas ready; and all whom he had marked as faithful were eager to go. Thushe had builded unwittingly for another future of responsibilities when hehad paused in the midst of the store's responsibilities to tell storiesof how a desert ranch is run.

  But one disciple did not even want to wait on the message. It was PeterMortimer, whom Jack caught on his way to the elevator at eight, his usualhour, to make sure of having the letters opened and systematicallyarranged when his employer should appear.

  "So you are going, Jack! And--and, Jack, you know?" asked Petersignificantly.

  "Yes, Peter. And I see that you know."

  "I do, but my word is given not to tell."

  Through that night's march Jack had guessed enough. He had guessed hisfill of chill misery, which now took the place of the hunger of inquiry.The full truth was speeding out to the desert. It was with John Prather.

  "Then I will not press you, Peter," he said. "But, Peter, just onequestion, if you care to answer; was it--was it this thing that drove mymother into exile?"

  "Yes, Jack."


  Then a moment's silence, with Peter's eyes full of sympathy and Jack'sdull with pain.

  "And, Jack," Peter went on, "well, I've been so long at it that suddenly,now you're going, I feel choked up, as if I were about to overflow withanarchy. Jack, I'm going to give notice that I will retire as soon asthere is somebody to take my place. I want to rest and not have to keeptrying to remember if I have forgotten anything. I've saved up a littlemoney and whatever happens out there, why, there'll be some place I canbuy where I can grow roses and salads, as you say, if nothing moreprofitable, won't there?"

  "Yes, Peter. I know other fertile valleys besides that of Little Rivers,though none that is its equal. I shall have a garden in one of them andyou shall have a garden next to mine."

  "Then I feel fixed comfortable for life!" said Peter, with a perfectlywonderful smile enlivening the wrinkles of his old face, which made Jackthink once more that life was worth living.

  Later in the morning, after he had bought tickets for Little Rivers, Jackreturned to the house. When he stood devoutly before the portrait, whose"I give! I give!" he now understood in new depths, he thought:

  "I know that you would not want to remain here another hour. You wouldwant to go with me."

  And before the portrait on the other side of the mantel he thought,challengingly and affectionately:

  "And you? You were an old devil, no doubt, but you would not lie! No,you would not lie to the Admiralty or to Elizabeth even to save yourhead! Yes, you would want to go with me, too!"

  Tenderly he assisted the butler to pack the portraits, which were put ina cab. When Jack departed in their company, this note lay on the desk inthe library, awaiting John Wingfield, Sr.'s return that evening:

  "Father:

  "The wire to Jim Galway which I enclose tells its own story. It waswritten after our talk. When I was going out to send it I saw JohnPrather and you in the hall. You said that you knew nothing of him. Ioverheard what passed between you and him. So I am going back to LittleRivers. The only hope for me now is out there.

  "I am taking the portrait of my mother, because it is mine. I am takingthe portrait of the ancestor, because I cannot help it any more than hecould help taking a Spanish galleon. That is all I ask or ever couldaccept in the way of an inheritance.

  "Jack."