CHAPTER XII
BLUE BLOOD
Dennis's mind was a chaos of conflicting feelings. The picture haddeeply interested him, and so did the beautiful girl that it by strangecoincidence so strongly resembled. It could not be otherwise with oneof his beauty-loving nature. And yet the impression made by the facein the painting--of something wrong, discordant--was felt moredecidedly in respect to the living face.
But before he had time to realize what had just passed the lady andher father appeared at the door of the office, and he heard the lattersay: "I know you are right, my dear. It's all wrong. The arrangementof the store is as stiff and methodical as if we were engaged in sellingmathematical instruments. But I have not time to attend to the matter,and there is not one in the store that has the least idea of artisticcombination, unless it is Fleet. I have noticed some encouragingsymptoms in him."
"What! he of the duster and mop? I fear our case is desperate, then,if he is our best hope."
Dennis's cheeks were burning again; but, turning his back, he rubbedaway harder than ever at a Greek god that he was polishing. But theygave him no thought. Speaking with a sudden animation the young ladysaid, "Father, I have a great mind to try it myself--that is, if youare willing."
"But, my daughter, I could not permit you to be engaged in any suchemployment before our customers."
"Certainly not! I would come early in the morning, before art-customersare stirring. I really should enjoy the task greatly, if I had any oneto help me who could in some faint degree comprehend the effects Iwished to produce. The long spring mornings soon to come would be justthe time for it. To what better use could I put my taste and knowledgeof art than in helping you and furthering our plan for life?"
Mr. Ludolph hesitated between his pride and his strong desire to gainthe advantages which the acceptance of this offer would secure. Finallyhe said: "We will think about it. I am expecting a great many new andbeautiful things early in the spring, and no doubt it would be wellthen to rearrange the store completely, and break up the rigid systeminto which we have fallen. In the meantime I appreciate your offer,and thank you warmly."
Dennis's heart leaped within him at the thought of instruction fromsuch a teacher, and he longed to offer his services. But he rightlyjudged that the proposal would be regarded as an impertinence at thattime. The successor of Pat Murphy was not expected to know anythingof art, or have any appreciation of it. So he bent his head lower, butgave Jupiter Olympus such a rubbing down as the god had deserved longago. In a moment more Miss Ludolph passed him on her way out of thestore, noticing him no more than she did his dust-brush.
Mr. Ludolph was the younger son of a noble but impoverished Germanfamily, and was intensely proud of his patrician blood. His parents,knowing that he would have to make his own way in the world, had senthim, while a mere boy, to this country, and placed him in charge ofa distant relative, who was engaged in the picture-trade in New York.He had here learned to speak English in his youth with the fluency andaccuracy of a native, but had never become Americanized, so much familypride had he inherited, and $o strongly did he cling to the traditionsof his own land.
He showed great business ability in his chosen calling, especiallydisplaying remarkable judgment in the selection of works of art. Sounusual was his skill in this direction, that when twenty-one yearsold he was sent abroad to purchase pictures. For several years hetravelled through Europe. He became quite cosmopolitan in character,and for a time enjoyed life abundantly. His very business brought himin contact with artists and men of culture, while his taste and loveof beauty were daily gratified. He had abundant means, and money couldopen many doors of pleasure to one who, like him, was in vigoroushealth and untroubled by a conscience. Moreover, he was able to spendmuch time in his beloved Germany, and while there the great ambitionof his life entered his heart. His elder brother, who was livinginexclusive pride and narrow economy on the ancient but diminishedancestral estate, ever received him graciously. This brother hadmarried, but had not been blessed or cursed with children, for theGerman baron, with his limited finances, could never decide in whatlight to regard them. Too poor to mingle with his equals, too proudto stoop to those whom he regarded as inferiors, he had lived muchalone, and grown narrower and more bigoted in his family pride day byday. Indeed, that he was Baron Ludolph, was the one great fact of hislife. He spent hours in conning over yellow, musty records of theancient grandeur of his house, and would gloat over heroic deeds ofancestors he never thought of imitating. In brief, he was like a smallbarnacle on an old and water-logged ship, that once had made many agallant and prosperous voyage richly freighted, but now had driftedinto shallow water and was falling to decay. He made a suggestion,however, to his younger brother, that wakened the ambition of thelatter's stronger nature, and set him about what became his controllingpurpose, his life-work.
"Make a fortune in America," said his brother, "and come back andrestore the ancient wealth and glory of your family."
The seed fell into receptive soil, and from that day the art andpleasure loving citizen of the world became an earnest man with apurpose. But as he chose his purpose mainly from selfish motives itdid not become an ennobling one. He now gave double attention tobusiness and practical economy. He at once formed the project ofstarting in business for himself, and of putting the large profitsresulting from his judicious selection of pictures into his own pocket.He made the most careful arrangements, and secured agencies that hecould trust in the purchase of pictures after he should return to theUnited States.
During his stay in Paris, on his way back, an event occurred that hada most untoward influence on his plans and hopes. He fell desperatelyin love with a beautiful French woman. Like himself, she was poor, butof patrician blood, and was very fascinating. She attracted him by herextreme beauty and brilliancy. She was very shrewd, and could seemanything she chose, being a perfect actress in the false, hollow lifeof the world. In accordance with Parisian ideas, she wanted a husbandto pay her bills, to be a sort of protector and base of generaloperations. Here was a man who promised well, fine-looking, and, ifnot rich, capable of making large sums of money.
She insinuated herself into his confidence, and appeared to share hisenthusiasm for the darling project of his life. He felt that, withsuch a beautiful and sympathetic woman to spur him on and share hissuccess, earth would be a Paradise indeed; and she assured him, inmany delicate and bewitching ways, that it would. In brief, he marriedher; and then learned, in bitterness, anger, and disgust, that she hadtotally deceived him. To his passionate love she returned indifference;to his desire for economy, unbounded extravagance, contracting debtswhich he must pay to avoid disgrace. She showed an utter unwillingnessto leave the gayety of Paris, laughing in his face at his plan of life,and assuring him that she would never live in so stupid a place asGermany. His love died hard. He made every appeal to her that affectionprompted. He tried entreaty, tenderness, coldness, anger, but all invain. Selfish to the core, loving him not, utterly unscrupulous, shetrod upon his quivering heart as recklessly as upon the stones of thestreet. Soon he saw that, in spite of his vigilance, he was in dangerof being betrayed in all respects. Then he grew hard and fierce. Thewhole of his strong German nature was aroused. In a tone and mannerthat startled and frightened her, he said: "_We_ sail for New York inthree days. Be ready. If you prove unfaithful to me--if you seek todesert me, I will _kill_ you. I swear it--not by God, for I don'tbelieve in Him. If He existed, such creatures as you would not. But Iswear it by my family pride and name, which are dearer to me than life,if you leave a stain upon them you shall _die_. You need not seek toescape me. I would follow you through the world. I would kill you on thecrowded street--anywhere, even though I died myself the next moment. Andnow look well to your steps."
The glitter of his eye was as cold and remorseless as the sheen ofsteel. She saw that he meant and would do just what he said.
The woman had one good point--at least, it turned out to be such inthis case. She was a coward na
turally, and her bad life made her dreadnothing so much as death. Her former flippant indifference to hisremonstrances now changed into abject fear. He saw her weak side,learned his power, and from that time forward kept her within boundsby a judicious system of terrorism.
He took her to New York and commanded her to appear the charming womanshe could if she chose. She obeyed, and rather enjoyed the excitementand deceit. His friends were delighted with her, but he received theircongratulations with a grim, quiet smile. At times, though, when shewas entertaining them with all grace, beauty, and sweetness, the thoughtof what she was seemed only a horrid dream. But he had merely to catchher eye, with its gleam of fear and hate, to know the truth.
He felt that he could not trust to the continuance of her good behavior,and was anxious to get away among strangers as soon as possible. Hetherefore closed his business relations in New York. Though she hadcrippled him greatly by her extravagance, he had been able to bringout a fair stock of good pictures, and a large number of articles ofvirtue, selected with his usual taste. The old firm, finding thatthey could not keep him, offered all the goods he wanted on commission.Soin a few weeks he started for Chicago, the most promising city of theWest, as he believed, and established himself there in a modest way.Still the chances were even against him, for he had involved himselfheavily, and drawn to the utmost on his credit in starting. If he couldnot sell largely the first year, he was a broken man. For months thebalance wavered, and he lived with financial ruin on one side, anddomestic ruin on the other. But, with a heart of ice and nerves ofsteel, he kept his hand on the helm.
His beautiful collection, though in an unpretentious store, at lastattracted attention, and after some little time it became _the_ thing inthe fashionable world to go there, and from that time forward hisfortune was made.
When his wife became a mother, there was a faint hope in Mr. Ludolph'sheart that this event might awaken the woman within her, if aught ofthe true woman existed. He tried to treat her with more kindness, butfound it would not answer. She mistook it for weakness on his part.From first to last she acted in the most heartless manner, and treatedthe child with shameless neglect. This banished from her husband eventhe shadow of regard, and he cursed her to her face. Thenceforth willand ambition controlled his life and hers, and with an iron hand heheld her in check. She saw that she was in the power of a desperateman, who would sacrifice her in a moment if she thwarted him.Through cowardly fear she remained his reluctant but abject slave,pricking him with the pins and needles of petty annoyances, when shewould have pierced him to the heart had she dared. This monstrous stateof affairs could not last forever, and, had not death terminated theunnatural relation, some terrible catastrophe would no doubt haveoccurred. Having contracted a western fever, she soon became delirious,and passed away in this unconscious state, to the intense joy andrelief of her husband.
But the child lived, thrived, and developed into the graceful girlwhose beauty surpassed, as we have seen, even the painter's ideal. Herfather at first cared little for the infant, but secured it everyattention. As it developed into a pretty girl, however, with winningways, and rich promise, he gradually associated her with his hopes andplans, till at last she became an essential part of his ambition.
His plan now was briefly this: He would entangle himself with noalliances or intimate associations in America, nor would he permit hisdaughter to do so. His only object in staying here was the accumulationof a large fortune, and to this for a few years he would bend everyenergy of mind and body. As soon as he felt that he had sufficient meansto live in such style as befitted the ancient and honorable nameof his family, he would return to Germany, buy all he could of theancestral estate that from time to time had been parted with, andrestore his house to its former grandeur. He himself would then seeka marriage connection that would strengthen his social position, whilehis daughter also should make a brilliant alliance with some memberof the nobility. Mr. Ludolph was a handsome, well-preserved man; hehad been most successful in business, and was now more rapidly thanever accumulating that which is truly a power with Europeans of blueblood, as with democratic Americans. Moreover, his daughter's beautypromised to be such that, when enhanced by every worldly advantage,it might well command attention in the highest circles. He sought withscrupulous care to give her just the education that would enable herto shine as a star among the high-born. Art, music, and knowledge ofliterature, especially the German, were the main things to which herattention was directed, and in her father, with his richly stored mind,faultless taste, and cultured voice, she had an instructor such asrarely falls to the lot of the most favored.
When Christine Ludolph was about sixteen years of age, events occurredwhich might have greatly marred her father's plans. She secretly formeda most unfortunate attachment, which came near resulting in aclandestine marriage. Although the world would have judged her harshly,and the marriage could only have been exceedingly disastrous to herfuture life, the motherless girl was not very much to blame. Even amongthe mature there is a proverbial blindness in these matters. She wasimmature, misled by her imagination, and the victim of uncurbed romanticfancies. But, after all, the chief incentive to her folly was a naturalcraving for the love and sympathy which she had never found in her ownhome. To her chilled young heart these gifts were so sweet andsatisfying that she was in no mood to criticise the donor, even hadher knowledge of the world enabled her to do so. Thus far, in his careof Christine, Mr. Ludolph had conformed to the foreign ideas ofseclusion and repression, and the poor girl, unguided, unguarded bykind womanly counsel, was utterly unsophisticated, and she might haveeasily become the prey of the unscrupulous man whose chief incentivehad been her father's wealth. Mr. Ludolph fortunately discovered thestate of affairs in time to prevent gossip. Under his remorselesslogic, bitter satire, and ridicule her young dream was torn to shreds.The man whom she had surrounded with a halo of romance was shown tobe worthless and commonplace. Her idol had chiefly been a creature ofthe imagination, and when the bald, repulsive truth concerning him hadbeen proved to her in such a way that she could not escape conviction,she was equally disgusted with him and herself.
For some weeks Mr. Ludolph treated his daughter with cold distrust."She will be like her mother, I suppose," he thought. "Already she hasbegun to deceive me and to imperil everything by her folly;" and hisheart was full of bitterness toward his child. Thus the poor girl dweltin a chilled and blighting atmosphere at a time when she most sorelyneeded kindness and wise guidance.
She was very unhappy, for she saw that her father had lost allconfidence in her. She fairly turned sick when she thought of the past.She had lived in the world of romance and mystery; she had loved withall her girlish power; and, however wrongly and unjustly, by theinevitable laws of association she connected the words "love" and"romance" with one whom she now detested and loathed. Within a weekafter her miserable experience she became as utter a sceptic in regardto human love, and happiness flowing from it, as her father had taughther to be respecting God and the joy of believing. Though seeminglya fair young girl, her father had made her worse than a pagan. Shebelieved in nothing save art and her father's wisdom. He seemed toembody the culture and worldly philosophy that now became, in herjudgment, the only things worth living for. To gain his confidencebecame her great desire. But this had received a severe shock. Mr.Ludolph had lost all faith in everything save money and his own will.Religion was to him a gross superstition, and woman's virtue and truth,poetic fictions.
He watched Christine narrowly, and said just enough to draw out theworkings of her mind. He then decided to tell his plan for life, andgive her strong additional motives for doing his will. The picture heportrayed of the future dazzled her proud, ambitious spirit, and openedto her fancy what then seemed the only path to happiness. She enteredinto his projects with honest enthusiasm, and bound herself by themost solemn promises to aid in carrying them out. But in bitternesshe remembered one who had promised with seeming enthusiasm before, andhe distrusted his daught
er, watching her with lynx-eyed vigilance.
But gradually he began to believe in her somewhat, as he saw her lookingforward with increasing eagerness to the heaven of German fashionablelife, wherein she, rich, admired, allied by marriage to some powerfulnoble family, should shine a queen in the world of art.
"I have joined her aspirations to mine," he said, in self-gratulation."I have blended our ambitions and sources of hope and enjoyment, andthat is better than all her promises."
When Dennis saw first the face that was so beautiful and yet so marredby pride and selfishness, Christine was about nineteen years old, andyet as mature in some respects as a woman of thirty. She had the perfectself-possession that familiarity with the best society gives. Mr.Ludolph was now too shrewd to seek safety in seclusion. He went withhis daughter into the highest circles of the city, and Christine hadcrowds of admirers and many offers. All this she enjoyed, but took itcoolly as her right, with the air of a Greek goddess accepting theincense that rose in her temple. She was too proud and refined to flirtin the ordinary sense of the word, and no one could complain that shegave much encouragement. But this state of things was all the morestimulating, and each one believed, with confidence in his peculiarattractions, that he might succeed where all others had failed. MissLudolph's admirers were unaware that they had a rival in some as yetunknown German nobleman. At last it passed into a proverb that thebeautiful and brilliant girl who was so free and courtly in societywas as cold and unsusceptible as one of her father's statues.
Thus it would seem that when circumstances brought the threads of thesetwo lives near each other, Dennis's and Christine's, the most impassablebarriers rose between them, and that the threads could never be woventogether, or the lives blended. She was the daughter of the wealthy,aristocratic Mr. Ludolph; he was her father's porter.
Next to the love of art, pride and worldly ambition were her strongestcharacteristics. She was an unbeliever in God and religion, not fromconviction, but from training. She knew very little about either, andwhat light she had came to her through false mediums. She did not evenbelieve in that which in many young hearts is religion's shadow, loveand romance, nor did her father take a more worldly and practical viewof life than she.
In marked contrast we have seen the character of Dennis Fleet, drawingits inspiration from such different sources.
Could two human beings be more widely separated--separated in thatwhich divides more surely than continents and seas?
Could Dennis have seen her warped, deformed moral nature, as clearlyas her beautiful face and form, he would have shrunk from her; butwhile recognizing defects, he shared the common delusion, that thelovely outward form and face must enshrine much that is noble and readyto blossom into good, if the right motives can be presented.
As for Christine, she had one chance for life, one chance for heaven.She was _young_. Her nature had not so hardened and crystallized in evilas to be beyond new and happier influences.
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